Lords Chamber

Tuesday 13th January 2026

(began 3 weeks, 3 days ago)

Share Debate
Watch Live
Skip to latest contribution
This debate has concluded
14:52
14:52
14:52
14:53
14:53
14:54
14:55
14:56
14:56
14:57
14:57
14:58
14:58
14:59
None Portrait Oral questions: Measuring success of the Youth Guarantee scheme, specifically employment and training outcomes and long-term labour market impacts
-

>> My Lords, the government's. >> Youth. Guarantee will increase opportunities for 16 to 24 year olds to. >> Make them work.
14:59
14:59
15:00
15:01
15:02
15:02
15:03
15:04
15:04
15:05
15:06
15:07
15:07
15:08
15:08
15:08
15:09
15:09
15:10
15:11
15:11
15:12
15:13
15:13
15:14
15:14
15:15
15:15
15:16
15:17
15:17
15:18
15:19
15:20
15:20
None Portrait Oral questions: Implications for the United Kingdom of the withdrawal by the United States from 66 international organisations, conventions and treaties
-

Both Oral Question Lord McConnell of Glenn Scott ODA.
15:20
15:21
15:22
15:23
15:23
15:24
15:24
15:25
15:26
15:26
15:27
15:27
15:28
15:28
15:28
15:29
15:30
15:32
15:32
15:33
15:33
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Portrait Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (Green Party)
-
-
Thank you. How nice to be back here again. I oppose clauses 118, 119 and 120 standing part of the bill. These clauses introduce a pre-emptive targeting of people based on location rather than behaviour, and that should concern anyone who cares about the right to peaceful protest. Under these clauses, a senior police officer may designate an area in anticipation of a protest based on a belief that an offence is likely to occur once that designation is in place. Simply wearing an item said to conceal identity becomes a criminal offence.

This applies to everyone in a designated area. Criminal liability comes not from contact conduct, but from being in a certain place and from what a person is wearing. That's a profound shift in approach and one I cannot support. It is also a massive, broad discretion. An inspector can designate a locality for up to 24 hours, extendable on the basis of a prediction, a guess rather than evidence of immediate serious violence. The result is a huge power to ban every day protective coverings across a place at a time based only on an estimate of what might happen.

That's exactly the kind of power that leads to over enforcement and a chilling effect on protest, particularly for those who already face risks from being identified. The government may say that defences to these exist for health, religion or work, but those protections operate after arrest and charge, not at the point where the person decides whether it's safe for them to attend a protest at all. That's the key issue here. Liberty supporters have been very clear about the real world impact, one disabled person wrote.

I'm clinically vulnerable. Forcing disabled people like me to unmask is surely disability discrimination. Another said as a single woman, I do not want to be identified. Women who have experienced domestic abuse may cover their faces for the same reason. For others, including diaspora activists and those with credible fears of transnational repression and anonymity, is not a political statement but a basic safeguard. We have already seen reporting on how mask restrictions at UK solidarity protests, including those linked to Hong Kong, have deterred participation because surveillance and reprisals are very real concerns.

This then becomes about who feels safe enough to exercise their democratic rights. And I must ask, are these clauses really necessary? Police already have targeted power under section 68 of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act, 1994, to require the removal of certain items, where this is justified. That power has been used in recent protest policing, including at protests outside a migrant hotel in Epping. So, Minister, what evidence does the government have of a gap in existing targeted powers that they cannot meet, rather than simply a desire for broader pre-emptive control? The government has not demonstrated an operational gap so far.

What we appear to have instead is a preference for wider pre-emptive control rather than targeted, evidence based policing. That matters because articles ten and 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights are absolutely clear, any restriction on protest must be necessary and proportionate, and the Strasbourg court has repeatedly warned against measures that deter peaceful participation through fear of sanction, a clause that criminalises ordinary behaviour across a designated area without reference to a person's actual behaviour, is precisely the kind of measure that risks crossing that line.

I want to ask the Minister, will the government consider narrowing the trigger to imminent and serious violence or disorder and introducing a clear front end, reasonable excuse protection, rather than relying on defences only after arrest? If the government's concern is intimidation or disorder, then the answer is better use of existing targeted powers, not a blanket approach that sweeps up disabled people. Women concerned about safety and minority communities along with everybody else. So for all those reasons, I support removing clauses 118, 119 and 120 from the bill.

I beg to move.
15:38
Lord Blencathra Portrait Lord Blencathra (Conservative)
-
-
Lord Singh I stand. >> Lady Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb, and suggest that it's vital that they do stand. >> Part of the. >> Bill, because protest is strongest when it is open, accountable and proud. A movement that hides its face borrows the language of secrecy, a movement that stands, unmask, invites public judgement and moral authority. And history teaches us, my Lords, that the most effective and morally persuasive movements were led openly. Emmeline Pankhurst marched into the public square and faced arrest, imprisonment without concealment, because the suffragette cause depended on moral clarity and public witness Arthur Scargill led the miners in mass action, visible and hidden.

Because solidarity is built on faces names, not anonymity, Martin Luther King Jr stood on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, all in the streets of Birmingham, with nothing to hide because non-violence and moral authority require openness. And Mahatma Gandhi led millions in acts of civil, civil resistance and a visible symbolic presence that made the movement impossible to ignore. My Lords, the government's own summary is clear about the purpose of these measures. A new criminal offence which prohibits the wearing or otherwise using of an item that conceals identity when an area designated by police under the new provisions, and that designation is constrained by a statutory trigger, a designation can only be made when the police reasonably believe that a protest may or is taking place in that area.

The protest is likely to involve or has involved the commission of offences, and that a designation would prevent or control the commission of offences. These are targeted powers aimed at preventing criminality whilst protecting lawful assembly. It's not about silencing dissent, it's about responsibility and transparency. And the fact sheet also notes that the practical enforcement tool, the bill also creates a new power for the police to require someone to remove a face covering during protest. And my Lords, that power underlines the expectation that those who lead and speak for causes should be prepared to be seen and held to account.

And I quoted all the historical protest leaders, but I can bring the House much more. Up to date. Contemporary political figures continue to lead visibly. My Lords, we all have tremendous respect for the noble Lady, the Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb, who has led a few protests in the past. I have looked at about 50 absolutely magnificent photos of the noble Lady protesting in Westminster and other areas and, and and being in the forefront of various Green Party protests. But she did say she'd been protesting all her life, but I could not find any of her as a schoolgirl at the anti-Vietnam or Aldermaston protests.

But she does have a varied repertoire stopping the police bill stop pension financing outside the Royal Courts of Justice with a banner saying neither confirm nor deny, stop fracking in Lancashire, stop dumping sewage, southwest water, renter's rights and many more with our trusty loudhailer. But my Lords, she also said that part of protest was to cause inconvenience and disruption. Well, I suggest that the three of them on the green hold it up for Gabala against Guantanamo Bay did not cause much inconvenience.

But, my Lords, the serious point, as I tease the noble Lady, is this that in every single one of her last 50 years of protest, she and her colleagues had their face uncovered, demonstrating modern political leadership in public demonstrations. So to all other organisations, I say, if the noble Lady Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb, whom I admire as a conviction politician, can protest so, so often and so frequently with her face uncovered, then so and can should everyone else so go on.

Organisers, encourage openness, train your marshals and make sure your aims are clear. And to the police. I say use these powers proportionately and protect lawful assembly. And to the public. I say support the right to protest and expect those who lead to do so with courage and transparency. My Lords, I conclude by saying when protest is unmasked, it persuades rather than intimidates. It invites debate rather than hides behind anonymity. And that is how movements achieve lasting change. I suggest.
15:42
15:44
Baroness Chakrabarti Portrait Baroness Chakrabarti (Labour)
-
-
I rise to agree with the noble Lord. Lord Pannick and Baroness Jay made her point so ably that I wasn't tempted until I heard, I'm afraid, Lord, that the noble Lord Blencathra is counter. It is firstly, simply a historic to suggest that the suffragettes know those protests who protesters who everybody loves now, but were once incarcerated and tortured by the British state. It is simply indeed went on hunger strike, but it's simply a historic to suggest there wasn't significant clandestine element to their to their operations.

And I'm sure that if one were to examine even other examples of the noble Lord gave, one would find greater complexity than he offered us in his his very than he offered us in his his very glib comments about protest. Just just minutes ago in this chamber, noble Lords from across the House expressed their horror at what has been happening in Iran on any given day in your Lordships House, similar comments will be made about Hong Kong or about protests anywhere else in the world.

And so I do think it is of concern that organisations that many of us respect, like, for example, justice, like Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and so on are now writing really very, very concerning reports about silencing the streets of the UK. Everyone loves protesters in their own cause, whether it's farmers or or whoever it happens to be at the time, but it's other people's freedom of expression that that is, that is concerning. My speech is free and everyone else's is a little bit more expensive.

But to suggest that people don't have valid, valid reasons for concealing their appearance at protests is just to totally misunderstand the danger that people have to put themselves into to to protest on many occasions, in particular outside various embassies in this capital. I think that the provisions on face coverings in this bill are far too broadly drawn. They are of a blanket nature and existing laws that would allow police officers to require individuals to remove a face covering, for example, on when they're stopped and searched or arrested are really a really adequate and more than adequate.

As it happens, I regret that noble friends on the front bench are now on reneging on things that were said not long ago, during the passage of 2022 and 2023. Legislation in this chamber. As if as if those comments about about freedom of expression and protest were never said. In fact, the government is now going further in in all of in all of the anti-protest provisions in this part of the bill. I regret that as a general proposition.

But I do agree with the noble Lord Pannick that on the face covering issue in particular, and on and on other provisions that we will come to this afternoon and no doubt this evening that there should be more targeting. And that was that was probably what I objected to the most about the noble Lord Blencathra remarks. To suggest that may cause a problem is targeted to allow blanket designation by the police is targeted. It is the opposite of targeted. It is blanket.

It chills freedom of expression, which experts say are already being chilled in this country. And I suggest that people should take the noble Lady Baroness Jay comments very seriously indeed.
15:48
Lord Strasburger Portrait Lord Strasburger (Liberal Democrat)
-
-
It is a pleasure to follow Baroness Chakrabarti, and I have to Baroness Chakrabarti, and I have to say I agree with everything she said. I should start by reminding the House that I have an interest as chair of Big Brother. Watch my Lords. In this group we are considering clauses 118, 119 and 120, which are not only draconian in their effect, but also very poorly drafted. I've got five questions about them for the Minister in the course of my speech, which I would ask him to respond to when he replies.

Clauses 118, 119 and 120 create a new offence of concealing identity at protest. But my Lords, as I will demonstrate, it is vital that individuals are able to preserve their anonymity at protests. And, as has already been said, other clauses in this in this bill promote the use at protests of highly intrusive and totally unregulated facial recognition technology. My Lords, we are currently in the Wild West with this mass surveillance technology. It is being used by law enforcement and private firms without any permission or regulation from Parliament, and with absolutely no oversight.

This bill contains the first mention of the phrase facial recognition in any legislation, and yet it does nothing to control or monitor its use. Perhaps the Minister could explain why this bill fails again to regulate and control this mass surveillance technology authorising its use, as this bill does, without first controlling how it is used, puts the cart way ahead of the horse. The combination of this mass surveillance and prohibiting face coverings at protests, as these clauses do have a chilling effect on people's willingness to participate in demonstrations.

My Lords, there are many categories of law abiding citizens who may prefer to conceal their identities at protests for entirely legitimate reasons. And we've heard some of them already from Lord Pannick, for example, those protesting against a foreign hostile state who fear retribution for themselves or their families, or those who prefer that their employer does not know their political views, or those who might be criticising their own religious or cultural communities or survivors of sexual violence and harassment, who need to stay below the radar, or those who simply do not wish to be the subject to mass surveillance by totally unregulated facial recognition.

Recognition technology. My Lords, anonymity is an important enabler of freedom of assembly and association. It allows participants a certain level of protection against the authorities, singling out or identifying specific individuals. My Lords, now turning to the drafting, there are some serious problems with clauses one one 8 to 120. First of all, clause 119 does not require that a person knows that they are in a designated area for them to commit an offence. This compares unfavourably with section 12 five and 14 five A of the Public Order Act 1986, which also imposes conditions on processions and assemblies, but the Public Order Act does include the requirement that at the time of the offence, I quote, the person knows or ought to know that the condition has been imposed.

End quote. There is no such requirement in clause 119 of the bill, and so a protester who knows nothing of such designation could well be arrested and prosecuted. Could the Minister please explain why that is right? Worse still, clause 118 appears to reverse the burden of proof. That means that a defendant would have the burden, presumably on the balance of probabilities, to prove that they were wearing a face covering for health or other reasons. Why is this not the normal criminal burden or standard? This risk people being wrongly convicted on the lower standard of proof.

And this is especially concerning as the offence has such wide application. Furthermore, anyone in the locality of a protest, even if they are there for completely different reasons, wearing a Covid style mask could be caught by this offence and my Lords would not have the normal protections of the burden and standard of proof at trial. Could the Minister please explain why this is the case? Furthermore, clause 119 has no limit on the types of offences that would give rise to the power to make the designation.

This means the designation could be made disproportionately, such as on the basis of only minor offences. In addition, My Lords, there is no protection from the offence itself and the designation being circular. This means that an officer may justify a designation against concealing identity on the basis that they believe the offensive concealing identity may be committed. Another problem with these clauses is that the maximum sentence of one month's custody is the same as for the offence of refusing to remove a face covering under section 60 of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994.

I think the Committee will agree that the conduct element of the section 60 AA offence is significantly more serious, refusing to comply with the lawful direction of a police officer, and by definition implies awareness of the condition. Unlike the new offence, it seems disproportionate that this new offence would attract the same sentence. Does the Minister agree? So, my Lords, clauses one one 8 to 120 are defective in many important ways. But in any case, even if they were better written, they would still unreasonably and unnecessarily inhibit and have a chilling effect on lawful protests.

For all these reasons, clauses 118, 119 and 120 must be strongly opposed and removed from this bill.
15:54
Lord Hogan-Howe Portrait Lord Hogan-Howe (Crossbench)
-
-
OK. >> The the clause about face. >> Coverings, I understand that I'm quite open minded about whether it's a good or a bad thing to have it's a good or a bad thing to have face coverings at protests, but just a couple of points I'd like the government to consider when considering whether to change this amendment in any way. The first thing I think the more conditions are imposed, as Lord Pannick suggested, to narrow it, which might be laudable, it will get harder and harder to enforce, and the officers on the street can only take action on what they see.

And if the person alleges that they have a member of their family in Iran or wherever it happens to be, it's going to be quite hard for the officer on the street, so it may make no difference at all to the initial action, the ongoing investigation and prosecution that might follow will then want to rebut, if they intend to, the claim that there is that defence available, so it will impose more burden on the prosecution. So I think we've got to be really careful about the conditions we impose upon it.

And my second point is just although we tend to think about face masks being worn by some people in the crowd, we could anticipate that everybody in the crowd was wearing a mask. Now, if that is the case, I think that can be quite an intimidating thing. That makes normal policing quite difficult to embark upon. For example, as somebody got a bail condition that they shouldn't attending the protest. One of the ways that you notice that is whether or not you can recognise them, but just in terms of general investigation, if everybody has a mask, it's quite difficult to distinguish one person from another, and we might anticipate some of the things we saw in the 1930s when, of course, people we have the legislation now from the 1960 36 Public Order Act, which was intended to stop people wearing uniforms.

And this could become a kind of uniform, at least an aspect of a uniform, to signify support for a political purpose. So I do think this clause, if it's to be moved forward, does need some thought, and I'm just asking for as much consideration as possible for the enforcers who will be criticised if they get it wrong. But if they're left in an invidious position, I think something we can anticipate now.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Before the. Lord Hogan-Howe sits down. I rather agree with his concern about rather agree with his concern about how ever more protest laws are to how ever more protest laws are to be operated in practice by by by police officers who are dealing police officers who are dealing with a growing, ever more complex statute book. I wonder what he thinks about comments from the thinks about comments from the noble Lord Strasburger that the powers already exist to to to require and direct people to remove a mask which could be done to individuals.

But in the hypothetical that he gives of everyone wearing a mask as a form of as a form of intimidatory uniform, I wonder what he thinks about the fact that the power already exists. And what is a what is an officer to do? Faced with

**** Possible New Speaker ****

these duplicative powers and offences? I think it's a fair question. I

**** Possible New Speaker ****

I think it's a fair question. I would only say that, generally speaking, if you've got a large crowd, you've got a significant number within the crowd. You're number within the crowd. You're wearing mask. Then the chance of you telling them all to take it off are very limited. So I think the if are very limited. So I think the if I understand the proposal, then it is to prevent people arriving at the march with a mask rather than the march with a mask rather than having to deal with it once they arrive.

If you have to deal with it, you're going to have to deal with it. But that's that's the only thing I would say is that you can't having masked up, you can't then expect officers to deal with a crowd of, let's say 5 or 6000. It's just impractical. So that's the argument against it. But I understand why it's made.
15:58
Baroness Fox of Buckley Portrait Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-affiliated)
-
-
I broadly agree with the excellent comments made by the noble Lady Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb in her moving of this, Moulsecoomb in her moving of this, and also noble Lord Lord Strasburger, I was reminded when the noble Lord Lord Carlile reminded us of the exemptions, which is that retrospectively, having been arrested or having had your your face mask removed or what have you, you can say, I was wearing this, this mask for health or reasons or work reasons or religious observance.

I think the fact that the the there is exemptions for those reasons and not for others indicates what a ridiculous situation is. Why those three things? Only as reasons why you're allowed to wear masks. But just think about it. You know. What work? Would you be allowed to wear? Masks? I mean, could you say, well, I deliver pizzas, so I've got helmets on. I mean, everybody could turn up wearing helmets. I it's to do with my work. I mean, it just doesn't make any sense to me.

And and the reason I say that is because we've heard what I just really want to emphasise that deciding to be an anonymity on a protest, in fact, in society is not necessarily the sign that you are a wrong'un, right? It doesn't mean you are free. We live in a free society, right? You can decide not to reveal your identity. When you go legally on a demonstration. You just don't want to be seen there for any number of reasons.

And actually, I've I know the noble Lord, the Minister has been on many demonstrations. He will know that, you know, there will be police officers pointing at people and so on, and identifying people as some sort of like, you know, troublemakers or something, even if you're doing nothing wrong. It's intimidating. That's the way it's used. So but I do think it is really important that I know people who are ex-muslim women who've been criticised, critical of Islamists, who don't necessarily want to be seen on a demonstration criticising Islamism.

Guess why that might be? Whistleblowers of all stripes protecting themselves from their employers, perhaps. Right. For reasons that that I don't need to spell out that really are examples these days of people being live streamed by hostile political opponents and doxed for going on demonstrations. So it might well be that you want to hide yourself. I mean, somebody did just make the I think one of the briefings that we got also made the point that it might just be that you're cold in today's conditions and wrap a scarf around.

I mean, who's going to decide what is, you know, nefarious and dubious and anything else. The main thing is, is that the police surely have the powers at the moment to deal with people that they think are problematic. And I, I do know what it's like to confront those cosplaying jihadists with their face coverings that I know are designed to be intimidating. I faced people in face masks on protests that I've been at on screaming abuse, and I can see that that's the problem that this is trying to address.

But the reality is there is a principle here of in a free society, you should be able to anonymously go on a demonstration unless you do something wrong. And if you do something wrong, then go and get on fine with me. And if there's a problem of mass but you think that they're masking up to intimidate whatever the police can, as it happens now, attempt to remove their masks. And when they were explained why they wanted this law, they said, well, we asked them to remove their masks, and then they go to another part of the demonstration and put them back on again.

And I thought, well, isn't the solution that you grabbed the mask off them? I mean, I don't I'm not very good on policing things, but I don't think we need to ban all of these masks, you know, ban anonymity effectively on demonstrations as a way of dealing with the fact that the police think there are some practical problems with the way the law is at the moment.
16:03
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames Portrait Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (Liberal Democrat)
-
-
My Lords, I also support. Baroness Jenkin position that Baroness Jenkin position that clauses. 118 to. >> 120 should be removed altogether

**** Possible New Speaker ****

120 should be removed altogether from the Bill. Lords, my reasons are really twofold. First, I regard are really twofold. First, I regard it as wrong and unjustified to prohibit people from concealing their identities at demonstrations, just as the noble Lady Baroness Fox of Buckley has said, let alone prohibiting anyone in a designated locality if they so wish from concealing their identities. And that's what the bill does. It's my noble friend, Lord Strasburger pointed out. The purpose of the clause is the second point can only be to enable the use of live facial recognition technology, to monitor demonstrations, to enable the authorities to determine who is attending them, and, frankly, to take action against them subsequently.

And I regard that as an offensive justification, certainly on the present state of the technology and the present lack of regulation of live facial recognition. My Lords, on the first reason overrule the prohibition of individuals concealing their identity involves introducing a big brother role for the state that is unwelcome and foreign to our notions of democratic freedom. The power may not be Orwellian in scale, but it has nasty totalitarian echoes of 1984. And we should remember that the catchphrase of the dictatorship in that novel was Big Brother is watching you.

The justified implication being that state observation of individuals is a principal instrument in the toolkit of dictatorship. No doubt that's the reason why the power to prohibit such concealment is hedged around in this bill by the complicated regime of designated localities, exempted purposes, and limited durations, and those limits on the prohibition of concealing identity are intended to act as a brake on the power. But in fact, with all the weaknesses mentioned by my noble friend Lord Strasburger Baroness Fox of Buckley and others, they emphasise how far the power is in fact a fetter on individual freedom.

My Lords, I fully appreciate that the power to designate a locality under clause 119 would arise only if a senior police officer reasonably believed that a protest was likely to involve, involve, or has involved the commission of offences, and that it would be expedient to exercise the power to prevent or limit the commission of offences. However, that has to be measured not only against the seriousness of the offences to be avoided, as Lord Strasburger pointed out, but against the right of individuals to wear a disguise which may be, as others have pointed out, a perfectly reasonable thing to do.

Lord Pannick spoke of protesters against the Iranian regime. What about journalists of whatever political persuasion who wish to report on a protest but do not want to be recognised by the protesters, or the public or employees who would rather not be recognised as attending to protest, recognised by their employers. The employers may have a political objection to the cause that the protesters are pursuing. Any figure who may be publicly recognisable, who wishes to take part in, or even just to attend a protest and wishes not to be recognised, may legitimately have that right to conceal their identity.

What about parents who do not want to be recognised at a protest by their children, or adult children who don't want to be recognised at a protest by their parents? The noble Lord Lord Brownlow Lord Blencathra, relied upon the public protests of Emmeline Pankhurst and Lord Pannick Lord Pannick rightly objected to that comparison. There were countless other suffragettes who did not want friends or family to know of their support for, or activity as suffragettes in protests, for the reasons that they might disagree with their family, parents, husbands, wives, friends, or simply for concern for their own safety.

The noble Lord Lord Pannick and Baroness Chakrabarti expressed the position of ordinary citizens who wish to keep their identities private. I go further, I say that in peace time it is the right of people to keep their identities private, and the state would have to justify any limit on that power. And it has not done that. We agree. We all agree that everyone has a right to protest, but we must all acknowledge that protests can and often do involve by some the commission of offences.

But the fact that protests may involve or be likely to involve the commission of offences by some people does not justify the police or the state in denying everybody who's in the designated locality to the right to conceal their identities. And this prohibition says to people, if you take part in or attend the protest or in the locality covered by the designation, you must be recognisable. I say to the Minister, that is an unjustifiable arrogation of power by the state, and it has to be justified by the government if they wish to legislate for it, and they haven't gone anywhere near justifying that arrogation power.

My Lords, my second reason for opposing this clause is that the prohibition on concealment of a citizen's identity can only have the one purpose of enabling them to be monitored on camera, with a view to being identified later. And let us examine that, if we may. At its most benign, the power may be directed only against those who commit offences, but where there where it is for that limited purpose, then it can be argued that preventing offences by persons identified on camera may be legitimate exercise of the power of the state, but I make the points made by Lord Strasburger in connection with that.

So justice police officers justify surveillance. So the power, if it were sufficiently defined and limited, might be justifiable. But the purposes of surveillance in this bill go much further, unacceptably so. And a dictatorial state may regard it as permissible to identify supporters of a particular view or political party, or cause for the purpose of keeping them under further surveillance, or, worse still, branding them as troublemakers for the future or, at the extreme, taking action against them, ranging them from ranging from pulling them in for questioning to arrest and unlawful imprisonment.

We have seen abuse of powers such as this in countries all over the world. The current country that is under consideration is Iran, but it has happened in many, many others. We only prevent abuse of power by being astute to limit police powers and state infringement of individual liberties in the first place. And this isn't just an argument about live facial recognition technology, which my noble friend considered, and we're going to consider more about that later. But it's an important argument about the legitimate limits on state power.

Clause 118 to clause 120 come nowhere near falling within those limits. Even had they been tightly drawn, which, as my noble friend and others have pointed out, they are not. For that reason, these clauses really ought to go here.
16:12
Lord Davies of Gower Portrait Lord Davies of Gower (Conservative)
-
-
Here. >> It would be interesting. >> My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb for tabling the stand part amendments. tabling the stand part amendments. However, we on these benches are unable to support these amendments as we have general support for clauses 118, 119 and 120. These clauses address a very real and increasingly familiar problem in modern protest policing. The deliberate concealment of identity to frustrate lawful policing and avoid accountability for criminal acts. I am sure all noble Lords have seen videos circulating on the news and online of protests, where large groups of masked or disguising their identity.

Often the only reason for this is to embolden themselves and each other to commit offences, knowing that their identification and subsequent prosecution will be next to impossible, and this undermines both the public confidence and the rule of law. Clause 118 creates a relatively tightly drawn offence, which would apply only where a locality has been designated by the police, because there is a reasonable belief that a protest is likely to involve or has involved criminality. It is not a blanket ban on face coverings.

Rather, the clause provides clear statutory defences for those wearing items for health reasons, religious observance or work related purposes. So I do not have concerns that these defences may be abused and I hope the noble Lord, the Minister, will be able to provide some assurances as to how he intends that this will not be the practical reality. Clause one nine and 120 provide for necessary safeguards and structures relating to the powers of clause 118. They stipulate that designation must be time limited, based on a reasonable belief, and authorised at an appropriate level.

There are explicit requirements to notify the public of the designation, the nature of the offence and the period for which it applies. These safeguards are very consistent with other provisions of the Public Order Act that relate to police powers to impose conditions on assemblies and processions. Removing these clauses would make policing protests even more difficult, as the noble Lord. Lord Hogan-howe has already outlined offenders who attend protests with the primary intent to commit crimes, whether related to the protest topic or not, will be able to evade justice more easily.

The vast majority of peaceful protesters are unfairly associated with disorder they did not cause. Effective policing protects the right to protest by isolating and deterring criminal behaviour within it. So, my Lords, for these reasons, we cannot support the amendments in the name of Baroness Stroud.
16:14
Lord Hanson of Flint Portrait Lord Hanson of Flint, The Minister of State, Home Department (Labour)
-
-
I am grateful to the noble Lady Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb for Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb for tabling her amendments to remove clauses one one 8 to 120. The House Committee is aware of what the purpose of those clauses is, and I'm grateful for the support of the noble Lord Davies of Gower and Lord Blencathra for the broad principle of the clauses. If I could just start by referring the noble Lady Lord Jones Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb to the front page of the Crime and Policing Bill, and she will see that Lord Hanson of Flint, which is me, has made the following statement, that the provisions of the Bill are compliant with the European Convention of Human Rights, which answers, I think the first point that the noble Lady has put to me.

And I want to also say that again, as someone who's been on protests, I want to commit the government to upholding the right to peaceful protest, but there must be proportionate to the rights of others to live, work and travel without fear, intimidation or serious disruption. And I totally reject the suggestion of the noble Lord Marks of Henley, that somehow I'm in a 1984 dystopia by producing some limits on protest. Where there is criminal action taking place, it is perfectly reasonable for Parliament to determine legislation as to how and when policing is protests, so that the right to protest is upheld at the same point as the right to enjoy life or to upheld.



**** Possible New Speaker ****

I'm so grateful. To my noble friend, the Minister, for giving way, and glad to hear for giving way, and glad to hear him restate his commitment to the Convention on Human Rights. He will Convention on Human Rights. He will know that that statement at the beginning of any bill is not a certificate of compliance, but a belief in the compliance of the of the contents of the bill. And so I the contents of the bill. And so I wonder if my noble friend could help me with, firstly, whether there has been any assessment in the Department of measures such as this in the hands of the future government, that did not share his commitment to human rights and how such powers might might be used.

And on the issue of having powers to to limit expression when offences are taking place, to quote in a couple of moments ago, may I remind him that in clause 119, which is the mechanism for designation, the the test is not that offences are taking place. It is it is about a it includes preventing the possibility of offences and and in relation to compliance. He will know that any limits on convention rights must be proportionate.

And yet the test for designation in clause 119 is not proportionality but expedience. Could my noble friend help the Committee with why the human rights language of proportionality has been substituted for the the test of expedience? And finally, could my noble friend say why it is that protest has been singled out in this way, and not, for example, carnivals or religious prayer vigils or other gatherings of people where they might conceal

**** Possible New Speaker ****

their identity. I'm grateful, and there's a number of points in there. And if my noble friend will allow me, I intend to answer the points in the debate during the course of the debate. But let me just say to her debate. But let me just say to her straight away that we have published our analysis of the obligations. I can refer it to her and ensure that if she hasn't got it to hand, I'll send it to her. It is published and is available for that.

And as I'll come on to in a moment, the rights that we're seeking in this piece of legislation for both protesters, the community and the government and the police force are measured in a way which I believe is acceptable, because in recent years, policing large scale process has posed significant challenges. And the noble Lord Hogan-howe referred to that while most participants exercise their rights peacefully and lawfully, a small minority have engaged in criminal acts while concealing their identity, and it is because the police have highlighted this issue with existing powers to identify those committing offences during protests.

That we have brought these issues forward, it's essential that the police can identify those committing offences during process, not only to ensure accountability and justice, but to protect peaceful demonstrators in the wider public from harm. Now I just say to the committee as a whole that clauses one one 8 to 120 is a careful balance. It is not going to apply to all protests. It only applies to protests that have been designated by a senior police officer of inspector rank or above.

And although, as has been mentioned by a number of contributors to the committee debate, the police currently do have powers to remove face coverings in designated areas. The police themselves have said to us, and it goes back to the point from the noble Lord Hogan-howe, that those measures are not always effective. In the context of managing protests, people often comply but then replace the face covering later, which is difficult to monitor in large gatherings, and the new offence addresses this by making it unlawful to wear a face covering once a locality has been designated by a police officer, not by a Minister, not by the government, by a police officer, in the light of upholding the rights as a whole.

And I say, first of all, that that senior police officer, at least of the rank of inspector, must reasonably believe that a protest is likely to occur, that the protest is likely. And this is the critical point coming to the contributions from Baroness Fox of Buckley. Indeed, the noble Lord Hogan-howe and others is likely to lead to criminal behaviour and that it's necessary to act to prevent or reduce such offences. Now, that's an important caveat. And that's not a 1984 dystopia that the noble Lord Marks seems to in a moment, in a moment.

It's not a 1984 dystopia. It's not, you know, me becoming Orwellian. It's not the government becoming Big Brother or being all saying it is about criminal potential activity where a police officer, not the government, not this House, not the House of Commons, a police officer determines the criminal action should be taken. And if a police officer determines that that space and time that that designation needs to occur, I think that's a reasonable thing to allow protests, but also to stop criminal behaviour.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

The noble Lord for giving way. I simply want to ask him this simply want to ask him this question. How far has the government stress tested these clauses against the test posed by clauses against the test posed by the noble Lady Baroness Chakrabarti as to whether, under the auspices as to whether, under the auspices of a future government, less benign than this Labour government, which than this Labour government, which I respect, and he knows that how far that stress testing has tested, for instance, how far the promotion of police officers to the rank of inspector may produce benign results, or how far the results could be Orwellian? I do not suggest that this government is Orwellian.

My suggestion is that there is potential in these clauses as drawn for bad consequences.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

I'll say two things to the noble Lord in that defence. His presumption, therefore, assumes presumption, therefore, assumes that a police force in five years time is going to be dominated by right wing conservatives. Reform members, Socialist Worker Party members who instruct the police force to instigate that designated area. I happen to believe, and I'm sure the noble Lord Howell would. Logan Howard would agree with me, Logan Howard would agree with me, that the police force is independent of government.

It has integrity. It determines policies based on legislation. And what this does is doesn't give a police officer the power to be a political commissar of right or left. What it does is give the police the power to say there is a criminal action, potentially in this designated space, and therefore in this designated space. We need to ensure that we can remove face coverings. And, you know, if there is another government for which he fears in the future in which all of us might fear different governments of different authoritarian natures, then I'm guessing they've won an election.

They've got 400 or so members of Parliament and they can pass what the heck they like. Anyway. So there is an argument to say to him that his fears are undermining the integrity of the police force, independence of the police force. And all I'm doing in this legislation is giving the police the power to take action, should they, as the police force, determine they want to do it now? The noble Lord Strasburger mentioned that it doesn't require someone to know they're committing the offence.

Well, clause 119, section two requires the police to notify in writing that the designation has been made. It requires the nature of the offence in which the locality to which the designation applies, and to the period when it applies, so it could even be a designation in writing for a time and a limited place. But it is important that we do so. Colleagues in the House have raised the question of religious medical exemptions and further loopholes. The purpose of the new offence is, as I've said, to prevent protesters from concealing their identity in order to avoid conviction for criminal activity in the designated place.

The measure does provide a reverse legal burden on the defendant to prove, on the balance of probabilities, that they wore a face covering for work purposes, religious or health reasons. But as with any charge, that's a defence in the bill. In the future act in law that allows people to say that I was a paint sprayer, I was suffering from prevention of illnesses that might cause further illness if I didn't wear a mask. Or I do have, you know, potentially a religious reason to wear a mask.

That's a defence in the event of any charge being made. But again, it's a defence at the time when the police officer might well say to an individual that that mask needs to be removed. Yeah, no, I can see him. I'm just before I let him in.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Be that as it may. What is. Does the Minister say to all the

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Does the Minister say to all the other categories which are not mentioned in in the clause as exemptions, that the people who exemptions, that the people who have work reasons or marital reasons or whatever, that are not reasons or whatever, that are not mentioned in those exemptions. What do you say to them about attending

**** Possible New Speaker ****

protests? Are they to just avoid protests on that basis? No. There are designations we've set down in law, and there are designations that are not set down in law. But the measure, again, is a proportionate one that the police can undertake. And in the event of an individual knowing that that is happening, the individual can accordingly take their own measures and either decide to protest or not protest. That doesn't curtail the right to protest. The measure does not either ban face coverings at every protest so an individual can go to a protest.

They can wear a face covering for the reasons that the noble Lord Strasburger has outlined, and only if the police believe that the criminal actions could be taken is that area designated, and then it's a matter for the individual where I believe the majority of peaceful, legitimate protests will not be captured by this legislation and

**** Possible New Speaker ****

the police must take. I'm very grateful to the noble Lord. He's making a very powerful Lord. He's making a very powerful case, but can I just ask him to focus on the defences which he's recognised? And what I don't understand is why it is a defence understand is why it is a defence for me to show that I wore a face mask because of my religion, but it's not a defence for me to prove the onus being on me that I wore a face mask because I was protesting against the Iranian regime, and I

**** Possible New Speaker ****

have family in Iran. The noble Lord Pannick makes a point, and I hear the point that he point, and I hear the point that he makes. But the question is, we have drawn a line in the defences. That drawn a line in the defences. That is the line that we have drawn. And again, I come back to the principle that the power to be used by the that the power to be used by the police officer, not the government, the police officer, is to determine this in the event of suspected criminality occurring.

And there may not be in the case that the noble Lord has mentioned the need for that designation, because the police may take a judgement, which is their judgement, to make that a protest outside. For example, the Iranian embassy would not lead to potential criminal activity. That is the judgement that we're making. That's the line that we're drawn. I you know, I note the point that he's made, but that's the defence that I can put to him today because.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Grateful to noble Lords Minister, may I say, I very much support what may I say, I very much support what you are saying. The only question is, will the police have the power is, will the police have the power not to require him to take his mask not to require him to take his mask off if they accept his view that that would cause some danger to him because of his or his family in

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Iran. The exemptions in the bill are very clear. And again, the exemptions in the bill I've talked about already relate to religious work or health reasons. Now, again, police officers will make a judgement on the ground and the police officers are again in the noble Lord Howell Hogan House experience have a significantly difficult job to do at any demonstration, and they will have to make a judgement on those issues on the ground. But if I can give any comfort to both the noble Lord Pannick and to the noble Lady as well, that all of the offences under this Bill are currently under review by the noble Lord Macdonald of River Glaven as part of the current review, which is undertaking to complete by spring 2026.

And I have no doubt that he will pay close attention to the comments that are made in this debate as well, and make an assessment to government about whether the points made by noble Lords are ones that he should reflect upon. But I would say to

**** Possible New Speaker ****

the committee, sir. Yeah. Astonished by that statement,

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Astonished by that statement, I'm afraid. Are you saying that we should pass we should knowingly pass faulty legislation because we pass faulty legislation because we know that Lord McDonald's will pick it up and sort it out later. Is that what you're saying.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

that what you're saying. Now? The noble. The noble Lord opposes the whole clauses altogether, doesn't he write, the altogether, doesn't he write, the noble Lord opposes the clauses, am I right? Right, well, I don't right? We have a difference of opinion on that. This is what Parliament's about. At Report stage. We may have a vote on it. I've heard the support of the noble Lord Davies of Gower and Lord Blencathra and others. I would seek their support in the division, and that House will determine what the House of Commons has already determined, whether those clauses are right or wrong for inclusion.

But what I'm saying is, on all occasions, there are always things that can be looked at and examined. And if the noble Lord panics, points are worthy of consideration. We will have opportunities to have those reviewed because the noble Lord Macdonald of River Glaven is going to produce a report for the Home Secretary on protest generally, and I can't say what he's going to say or how he's going to say it, or what recommendations he's going to make, or whether we accept those recommendations.

I've simply said to the noble Lord today, I believe the clause is 118119 and 120 should stand. He doesn't. I believe that they're right and proper and effective, and they've got powers for the police to do business in a coordinated way to prevent crime. I do, he doesn't. And there are points that have been made today which no doubt the noble Lord MacDonald will reflect on and may make recommendations to government accordingly. And we may make issues later on. But I would say to him now, and to anybody else in the committee, that these powers are ones that the police have asked for to ensure better policing, to prevent crime that are compliant with the European Convention of Human Rights.

In my view, they are proportionate and they provide a mechanism to ensure that people who are potentially at protests, who commit crime, do not commit those crimes without any understanding. I'll just come back to one final point before I give way to my noble friend. The noble Lord Strasburger also talked about facial recognition. He will know that later on in this bill, we deal with issues to do with facial recognition. And he would also know that the government is currently undertaking a consultation on facial recognition, pending comments from anybody who wishes to make them pending.

Therefore, better regulation of how any facial recognition is utilised in later legislation at some future point post this bill. And so I would say to him, you know, whatever concerns he has on facial recognition, I believe it's still a valuable tool for policing, but we can examine those at some point downstream and there will be an opportunity to

**** Possible New Speaker ****

test his views versus the houses at some point. Hon. Friend. I'm so grateful to you, to my

**** Possible New Speaker ****

I'm so grateful to you, to my noble friend, for his detailed responses and for his patience in taking interventions. And could he, taking interventions. And could he, in a moment, deal with my point about why the word expedient has been used in clause 119 rather than been used in clause 119 rather than proportionate? Because he himself has talked about proportionality many times. And of course he will many times. And of course he will know that the test for lawful interference with convention rights is proportionality rather than expedience.

And in the light of comments made in this committee by by noble Lord, such as the noble Lord Pannick, who doesn't who doesn't oppose the provision outright, would he consider just consider between now and report adding to the defences an additional defence of fear of reprisal, adding that to the health provision, for example, I wonder if he might just consider that going forward.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Well, well, the for my noble friend, the wording in the bill is the wording the government have the wording the government have agreed, and that is the position that we take, and we may have a disagreement on that. If she wishes to put an amendment down at report to change that wording, that's a matter for her. That's the wording that we've come to an agreement. that we've come to an agreement. She's made a further suggestion about a further defence. Those are about a further defence.

Those are matters that I would suggest that should be considered by the Lord Macdonald of River Glaven as part of the discussion that we've had to date. If she wishes to expediate that quickly, she has the opportunity with anybody else to table an amendment at report. But the government has given serious consideration to this. Clauses 118119 and 120 are the result of those considerations there at the request of the police. They are proportionate. They are, in my view, compliant with human rights. And I commend them to the House and would in a gentle way, urge the lady not today or indeed in future to seek to withdraw them.



**** Possible New Speaker ****

Before the noble Lord sits down. I happen to support, actually, I I happen to support, actually, I happen to support this particular clauses. I've still got the same clauses. I've still got the same concern as a noble Lord Pannick that have you drawn this rather too that have you drawn this rather too narrowly, that there may be areas that you may have to consider? that you may have to consider? Secondly, again, you're quite right. The clauses give this power to the police in order to prevent crimes being committed.

What happens if the police get it wrong? We all know what has happened with Sarah's Law reasonable grounds to suspect, and they have suspected it. And they have stopped people again and again. And nothing actually was worth suspecting. So what would happen? And I don't want an answer. What I want to is a possibility of considering. What if the police get it wrong? We got the Birmingham question. Still, I don't want to talk about it because the inquiries that are going on, what if the police get it wrong? What measures are you wanting to surround that particular conundrum? Because it is there.



**** Possible New Speaker ****

And could I just add to save time? I know people are trying to expand the number of conditions, expand the number of conditions, but just like us, to not run away with the assumption that the work face mask is one that makes sense. face mask is one that makes sense. Intuitively it does. But I don't understand the paint sprayer who's at a protest, who's wearing their at a protest, who's wearing their mask. I don't understand why a work if there are protest or they're at work.

I'm not sure why they're wearing the mask at the protest. So I just don't understand that

**** Possible New Speaker ****

juxtaposition. And it may be the Lord McConnell to consider as well. Well, time is pressing for the

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Well, time is pressing for the response, but it's largely due to interventions as well. But can I just say to the the right reverend just say to the the right reverend Prelate Lord Sentamu that the police, the main objective of the police, I think, in all of this police, I think, in all of this process will be to ensure that there's a peaceful demonstration with no trouble for the community at large, and if the police over police, an issue that potentially is an area where trouble can commence.

So I give the judgement to the police to do this in a proper and effective way. What I will do is a number of comments have been made. We will always reflect on those comments, but I stick because of particularly because of time. So the contention that the clauses should stand part of the bill.
16:36
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Portrait Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (Green Party)
-
-
I know I can't tell you how much energy and self-control it's taken energy and self-control it's taken to keep. Stay seated with all these interventions and and comments. interventions and and comments. First of all, I'd like to thank the noble Lord Lord Blencathra for his very kind comments and for the photographs, which have obviously brought back a lot of very nice memories, happy memories. So thank you. Thank you for that. Now, the other aspect to my having to exercise those of self-control in staying sitting down is that I get very agitated, very irritated, in fact, and I scribble all over the papers I've got in front of me, so it makes it difficult sometimes to reply fully.

But I'm going to do my best, and I beg the patience of the house in allowing me to go through all my scribbles. First, I want to thank the noble Baroness, Lady Lady Fox for support for their support and also Lords Strasburger and Marx. I am very grateful and obviously this is a day that will go in my diary when the noble Lord Lord Pannick actually agreed to something, I said, it's, it's, it's it's quite rare. Now, I did put.



**** Possible New Speaker ****

I didn't necessarily agree that Baroness Jones should be mentioned in the same sentence as Martin in the same sentence as Martin Luther King and Emmeline Pankhurst, but I just wanted to make that

**** Possible New Speaker ****

clear. Thank you. I would like to I would like to say, by the way, that I did go to Aldermaston, but my first real protest was in 1968 when I was 18. I went on CND rally and I was 18. I went on CND rally and it was peaceful. At least I think it was. I can't remember actually. it was. I can't remember actually. Now it is. It is not difficult to counter the noble Lord Lord Blencathra arguments because quite honestly, he talked about my being brave enough.

Or perhaps he didn't use the word brave to go to protests without a mask. But of course, I'm a highly privileged white female and he is a highly privileged white male. It is not for us to say who might be vulnerable and who might not, and who might fear reprisals and who might not. So I you know, let's remember, there are people who live in fear of other people, and those people could easily be deterred from going to protests. Now, on the noble Lord Hogan-Howe point and on the noble Lord Minister's points.

The fact is the police have enough powers already. And if the police really are requesting this, surely the government should have a little bit more pragmatism about what it's passing and the fact that the noble Lord, the Minister, is so happy that two Tories are supporting him, I find quite shocking, quite honestly, if that's the only people who can rouse to support him in this, in your Lordships House, that really says something. And I don't mean any of you to stand up and support him.

It's it's not necessary. Now, on the issue of police getting confused, because the legislation at the moment is very confused. There is so much of it and they are. Thank you. Lord Hacking is absolutely right. And and for example, Steve Bray, the the man who does all the Brexit very loud protests in Parliament very loud protests in Parliament Square. I thank the members of this on this side not to comment on my on my speech if possible.

Apparently last week the police tried to close him down in spite of the court ruling that said it was illegal what he was doing and they made, I'm told, the absurd and fatuous claim that the judgement had been repealed. That's completely wrong. It's complete nonsense. This is what the police have said. They are confused. I don't blame the police for this. I think that the the law now has reached such proportions on protest that they really can't be expected to stay up with, with what's happening.

If you make bad law. I mean, the law. The Minister was saying, oh, it's you know, the police are going to make these decisions. We've got to trust the police and, and have lots of confidence in them. But actually, if you make bad law, you are responsible, not the police. You are responsible for passing laws which are firstly unnecessary and secondly plain wrong. And the police have to try to put that into practice. And that's that is not fair. Hold on.

I think I might have said everything actually. Anyway, I think this is terrible. These clauses should be thrown out or should at least be rewritten because they are not useful. They're not useful to people protesting who are in genuine fear of their lives, but who want to protest about something. And they're not useful for the police who already have the powers. And I did ask in, in my first in my first opening speech, if the noble Lord could actually point me to the gap in legislation.

That and if the police have really asked for these clauses, then they don't even know the legislation properly. So very unwillingly. And I'm glad the noble Lord, the Minister, suggested I bring this back at report. I will

**** Possible New Speaker ****

withdraw my motion, my amendment. My Lords, the question is that

**** Possible New Speaker ****

My Lords, the question is that clause 118 stand part of the bill as Minister. That opinion will say content. Content to the contrary, content. Content to the contrary, not content. The contents have it. The question is that clauses 119 and 120 stand part of the bill, as and 120 stand part of the bill, as many of that opinion will say content. Content the contrary, not content. Content the contrary, not content. The contents of it in clause 121, amendment 369, A Lord Davies of Gower.
16:42
16:43
None Portrait Amdt: 369A Lord Davies of Gower (Conservative)
-

been nothing less than a confused mess, as Policy Exchange noted in mess, as Policy Exchange noted in their report, might is right. We have entered an era of increasingly disruptive protests. We have seen severe disruption from the likes of Just Stop Oil, Extinction Rebellion Just Stop Oil, Extinction Rebellion and pro-Palestinian groups. So my amendments together seek to restore clarity and proportionality to our clarity and proportionality to our public order law following the deeply troubling consequences of the Supreme Court of the Supreme Court's decision in Ziegler, the starting point must be an uncomfortable truth.

The law, as it now stands, has tilted too far in favour of those who seek to justify criminality and serious disruption on the basis of contentious political beliefs, and that tilt did not arise from legislation passed by Parliament, but from judicial interpretation. It has been Parliament's clear intention to prevent such actions from occurring in the name of protest. That is evident by the legislation that has been passed in recent years. But the will of Parliament has been, to at least some degree undermined by the judiciary, most notably in the Ziegler ruling, which has elevated protest related rights under articles ten and 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights, above the practical ability of the state to prevent intimidation, obstruction and damage.

So I would argue that the proportionality analysis mandated by the Human Rights Act 1998 has migrated from being a safeguard of last resort into a routine defence for conduct that Parliament has plainly intended to criminalise. In effect, the courts are being invited to weigh the importance of a cause against the harm done to the public. That is not the rule of law. It is moral relativism dressed up as jurisprudence. These amendments offer a direct, and, I would argue, refreshingly simple, response.

The first two amendments, 369A and 369B make clear that an honestly or sincerely held political belief cannot constitute a reasonable excuse or good reason for the new offensive. Possession of pyrotechnics at protests and the climbing on specified war memorials. These provisions speak to a wider principle the law applies to all, and the law cannot be overridden by the subjective beliefs of the offender. However passionately held. It does not matter if you think your particular cause is more morally righteous than another's, nor does it matter how sincerely you hold that belief.

If you are committing criminal acts, you should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law. The more substantive amendments 362B and 382D, as well as 378B from my noble friend Lord Blencathra address the heart of the problem exposed by Ziegler amendment 302 B reforms the lawful excuse defence in the Criminal Damage Act 1971, so that it cannot be relied upon where damage is committed to intimidate, harass, inconvenience or harm others, where it is justified solely by belief or where it is carried out in the course of a public protest.

It also restores an objective element to belief, requiring it to be reasonable as well as honestly held. That is a critical correction. We have seen the impact of the current state of affairs in action in October 2020 for Manchester Magistrates Court cleared two Just Stop Oil activists who had glued themselves to a painting in the Manchester Art Gallery in 2022. The court ruled that they were not guilty because their actions were proportionate in the face of the climate crisis. My Lords, how can this be? How can we allow the law to permit the commission of criminal offences simply because a person is concerned by climate change? Amendment three a 2D goes further by removing the reasonable excuse defence altogether from a range of public order offences, including those introduced in the Public Order Act 2023.

This is not radical, it is consistent. Parliament has already decided that conduct such as locking on, tunnelling and obstructing key infrastructure is inherently harmful to the to then allow a broad, open ended, reasonable excuse defence is to invite precisely the kind of litigation and uncertainty that Ziegler has produced. Noble Lords will recall that during the Report stage of the Public Order Act 2023, a number of peers, most notably noble Lords Lord Hope of Craighead and Lord Faulks, and the then Minister, my noble friend Lord Sharpe of Epsom, sought to introduce amendments to clarify and constrain these defences.

Those debates revealed a shared concern across the House that complexity and judicial direction were undermining the effectiveness of the law. The amendments before us today pursue the same objective, but in a more straightforward way, rather than endlessly redefining what counts as a reasonable excuse, they remove that ambiguity altogether. Turning to amendment 369 AA in the name of my noble friend Lord Blencathra, I wholeheartedly agree with the reasoning he has set out, and this is very much in line with the argument I have put forward.

There is no good reason to climb on a war memorial or a memorial of a past leader, except for when the individual has the consent of the memorial's owner. This exception is accounted for in subsections two the and two C of clause 122. And so I see no reason for the extra defence in subsection two. A perhaps the Minister can clarify which other motives would count as good reasons for climbing on memorials. And so finally, my Lords, we must confront the constitutional issue.

The European Convention on Human Rights has given domestic effect by Human Rights Act, has come to operate as a brake in Parliament's ability to legislate decisively against disruptive protests. The balancing exercise required by Strasbourg jurisprudence is not neutral. It systematically favours protest activity, even where it causes serious harm to others. So these amendments would simplify. We would simplify Parliament, reasserting its right to draw clear boundaries in the public interest. I beg to move.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Amendment proposed clause 121, page 149, line 32. At end. Insert page 149, line 32. At end. Insert the words printed on the Marshalled List.
16:49
Lord Faulks Portrait Lord Faulks (Non-affiliated)
-
-
>> My Lords, I.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

My Lords, I. My Lords, my amendment is 382 H to which Lord Godson and Lord to which Lord Godson and Lord Hogan-Howe have added their name. It's an amendment which covers all the use in this area of the law of the defence of lawful or reasonable excuse in relation to public order offences, as the noble Lord, Lord Davis, has said, the law is in a state of incoherence at the moment. It's important, of course, that the law in this area adequately reflects the right to protest, about which there is no issue amongst any of your Lordships.

It also must reflect the interests of third parties who are affected by protests, significantly affected by protest. And it also must, the law must be sufficiently clear for the police to be able to know what their powers are, and to exercise them sensibly and lawfully. And finally, the law has to be sufficiently clear that members of the public think that it does reflect the various interests which are reasonably involved in the whole question of what is lawful protest and the limits of lawful protest.

The decision in Ziegler was, I think it's broadly accepted, a wrong turning by the Supreme Court. It's accepted, I think, by people across political persuasions. And I too, like the noble Lord, Lord Davis, would very much praise the long and persistent work of policy exchange to expose the shortcomings of that decision and the uncertainty that it's created in terms of the application of the law. Now, it's never, of course, easy for a court to decide what is or is not a reasonable or lawful excuse.

But the amendment that we have put down, of course, assumes that there is sufficient evidence for there to be an offence in the first place. I mean, that's a significant rider, of course, but it also provides that there is no excuse for the conduct if a it's intended to intimidate, provoke, inconvenience or otherwise harm members of the public by interrupting or disrupting their freedom to carry on lawful authority or activity, or it's designed to influence the government of public opinion by subjecting any person or their property to a risk or increased risk of loss or damage.

I think what's perhaps somewhat unusual about this amendment, as opposed to the other amendments in the group, is Subclause five, which says this for the purposes of the Human Rights Act 1998, this section must be treated as necessary in a democratic society for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others. Now, as the noble Lord, Lord Davis said, The European Convention and its incorporation in our law by the Human Rights Act has very much changed or potentially changed the analysis of all sorts of legal situation, particularly in this area.

The common law provides that there are certain rights that we recognise, like, for example, the right to free speech or freedom of association. But as those of us who remember our legal lectures will be told, those rights only exist insofar as they're not made unlawful by some other intervention, either of the courts or of Parliament, so that rights don't trump anything. But nonetheless, nobody would doubt that we do have freedom of speech. We do have freedom of assembly.

One of the problems about the European Convention is that it states rights. Some of the rights are absolute and some of the rights are qualified rights, such as relevant to this particular area of the law. Articles ten and articles 11. So it doesn't provide an absolute trump card that you can never, as it were, contravene a a law on the basis that you have an absolute right to freedom of expression. Article ten or article 11, a right to peaceful assembly.

In fact, the the European Court in Strasbourg has not said that it is not open to individual countries to decide what are reasonable limits of those rights and where I think Ziegler went seriously wrong was, as it were, ducking the issue by simply saying that quite apart from what Parliament has said about reasonable excuse and the like, nonetheless a particular court has to decide proportionality for itself, whether that's a judge or a jury. There's a particular paragraph, paragraph 59, which says this determination of proportionality with rights is a fact specific inquiry which requires the evaluation of the circumstances in the individual case.

With great respect, that's not very helpful for a court in deciding whether or not an offence has been committed, or whether or not a defence is permitted in law. In fact, I think it went too far because the European Court of Human Rights does not say that individual legislatures should not attempt to legislate by striking the balance to reflect those matters. I referred to at the beginning of my remarks. For example, in 2024, the case of Lord Ashton and the Netherlands, they said this physical conduct purposefully obstructing traffic and the ordinary course of life in order to seriously disrupt the activities carried by others is not at the core of that freedom, as protected by article 11 of the convention.

In other words, Strasbourg does not say that Parliament cannot legislate in this space if they think it is appropriate to reflect the various different matters that are so important in deciding what are the limits of lawful protest. This particular amendment and I support other amendments in this group, makes the law a great deal clearer. It says you do not invoke some vague notion of proportionality. You simply decide whether there is a lawful excuse in order, in accordance with those, I think, fairly straightforward provisions we've contained in our amendment.

And you may remove from your considerations any of the vagueness of proportionality that emanates from the European Court of Strasbourg, because you can take it that Parliament has decided that in all the circumstances it has taken into account all those rights, whether they be rights at common law or rights, in accordance with the European Convention on Human Rights, and it is satisfied itself, just as the noble Lord Lord Hanson satisfied himself about the particular bill that it complies with the European Convention on Human Rights.

That is clarity. That is what this amendment seeks. I imagine that the the noble Lord may have in his notes when responding to this convention, the name of Lord Macdonald of River Glaven by the look on his face. I'm not I'm not wrong about that. What I would say is this. And I very greatly respect the Lord Macdonald of River Glaven, and I'm sure that he'll come up with some extremely sensible suggestions. But we know that the the law is not in a good place at the moment.

That protest is a particular feature. And why not at the moment? Because there are so many things. After all, to protest about. We need the law to be clearer sooner than even the diligence of Lord MacDonald may produce. And therefore I suggest that the the noble Lord, who I know will be taking you on board all the ideas in this space, should consider carefully whether or not we can remedy this wrong. Make the Lord clearer, so that all involved in this particular sphere of law can know what the law is.
16:58
Lord Bishop of Manchester Portrait The Lord Bishop of Manchester (Bishops)
-
-
Thank you. >> Thank you. >> My Lord. The more I listen to this debate this afternoon, the more worried I'm getting. I mean, more worried I'm getting. I mean, it seems to me that we are over the recent years, we have successively tightened up regulations around protests, including quite peaceful protests, making it harder and harder for people to express publicly their deep concerns about a whole range of issues. I'm not actually sure we need more clarity. I think that is for judges and juries to determine on the details of particular case.

I'd rather that the whole principle of the jury system is that we are judged by our peers, and that if we've undertaken some activity and that's brought us before the courts, it's for it's for other people like ourselves to determine in the particular instances. And they can take into account the, the culture, the context in a way that's impossible to do by way of legislation. So I think I'm actually quite wary about over specifying here. Sometimes clarity is not not necessarily the best thing to achieve.

One final small point. I know a number of amendments in this group, and in some other groups refer to processions. The area where I grew up in Moseley and Saddleworth in Greater Manchester. The Whit Friday processions are a thing of beauty and a joy forever, and the whole towns and villages are affected. The many roads are closed for much of the day, clearly causing massive disruption to people who would otherwise be travelling on those particular through through roads. So I would want some assurances from the noble Lord, the Minister.

There's no intention that this bill could be used to prevent traditional religious processions or other processions taking place, simply because they happen to close the road for a while. Or think of the procession in Liverpool city centre. A few months ago, when that dreadful incident happened, I guess the the bloke driving his car felt his his journey was being impeded. But people have to have the right to hold their processions to celebrate the victories of their football teams. Even in Liverpool, which is a mancunian I struggle with, even in Liverpool they have the right to have their processions, their civic processions, their football processions and please, in Greater Manchester, religious processions.

I'd be grateful. The noble Lord, the Minister, could assure us that that this nothing in this bill could be used to limit those kinds of peaceful, traditional celebrations and processions.
17:00
Lord Pannick Portrait Lord Pannick (Crossbench)
-
-
By. Group are motivated by concern, understandable concern about the decision of the Supreme Court in the Ziegler case, which is 2021 UK, SC number 23. The noble Lord Lord Davies of Gower and the noble Lord Lord Faulks made powerful submissions in relation to that case. The committee may wish to be reminded that the Supreme Court reconsidered the statements made in Ziegler in the Abortion services case, which was 2022 Uksc 32, and further guidance on the issues in Ziegler was given by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Burnett of Maldon as the Lord Chief Justice in the Kerkorian case.

I hope I pronounced that correctly. See you. C r u r e a n, which is 2022. Three weekly law reports 446. And what the Supreme Court said in the abortion services case is that it's not right, that it's for the jury or the magistrates in each individual case to assess whether or not the conduct of the defendants comply is protected by human rights law, which was the the concern, as I understand it, of my noble Lord, Lord Foulkes.

And indeed the Bishop of Manchester suggested that's highly desirable. It's not the law in the in the abortion services case, paragraph 63 to 66, Lord Reid, who, of course, is the president of the Supreme Court, speaking for a seven person Supreme Court and in large court, because of the importance of the issue, addressed the principles. Lord Reid said at paragraph 63, the first question is whether, in a case where the exercise of rights under articles 9 to 11 of the convention is raised by the defendant to a criminal prosecution, there must be an assessment of the proportionality of any interference with those rights on the facts of the individual case.

Lord Reid said no. The answer's no. Paragraph 64. Second question is whether, where an offence is liable to give rise to an interference with the exercise of rights under articles nine, 10 or 11 of the convention. It's necessary for the ingredients of the offence to include or be interpreted as including the absence of reasonable or lawful excuse in order for a conviction to be compatible with the convention rights. Again, the answer is no, said Lord Reid. And thirdly, paragraph 65.

The third question is whether it's possible for the ingredients of an offence in themselves to ensure the compatibility of a conviction with convention rights under articles nine, ten and 11. And the answer, said Lord Reid, is yes. So the position under the law at the moment is that the prosecution will say that Parliament has enacted a specific offence, that is the law of the land, and it is simply not open to the defendant to say that they're entitled to seek to overturn the ingredients of the offence by reference to convention rights.

The law of the land is set out in the criminal offence, and therefore much of the criticism of Ziegler fails, if I may respectfully say so, to recognise that the courts themselves have understood that Ziegler went too far, and that what Parliament is determined in relation to the law is the governing law. Notwithstanding articles 9 to 11 of the convention.
17:05
Lord Blencathra Portrait Lord Blencathra (Conservative)
-
-
I've got a couple of amendments in this group. But first of all, could I say to the right reverend Prelate that the peaceful, religious processions he had in mind were not the sort of processions the Chief Constable of Manchester had in mind when he recently said something to the effect that it's in an appalling increase in aggro and violence and demonstrations. And I think, he said the intolerable has now become the normal. I think that's quite different from the peaceful processions the right reverend Prelate had in mind.

And also, before I start my amendments, could I say how much I enjoyed the noble Lord, the Minister and his wind up in the last debate. He was an absolutely top form, especially in his demolition of the noble law of the Lord Marks. And I suspect that most of those best bits of his speech were not written by his officials. But I shall I shall treasure them. I hope I don't become a victim of such a wonderful oration against me. Now, my Lords, I have two amendments here.

The first one is a quite small, simple one. The second one is slightly more complicated now. Subclause two two of my amendment. Sorry. Subclause two amendment of one, two, two says it's a defence for a person charged with an offence under this section to prove that the A had a good reason for climbing on the specified memorial. B were the owner occupier. The memorial or c had the consent of the owner or occupier. To do so, my amendment would delete the general excuse for having a good reason, and the only defence is left for a person charged with an offence under clause one, two, two would be that the owner or occupier of the memorial, or had the consent of the owner of the occupier to to climb onto it.

Now, I do wonder about the word occupier. I presume that is to cover memorials which are not just statues, but are buildings possibly like the Hall of Memory in Birmingham. I'd be grateful for slight elucidation on what is meant by the occupier of a memorial. Now, turning to my new clause 378B. It's simple in principle, but it looks a bit complicated. But it simply reproduces the operative test from the 2023 regulations on Serious Disruption to the life of the community and the definition of community.

It puts on the face of the act, giving those tests primary law status. I suggest, my Lords, this improves legal certainty and parliamentary scrutiny. Now, my Lords, many clauses in this Bill and the amendments talk of speak of serious disruption to the life of the community, and we may conclude that from that the disruption has to be pretty serious indeed to qualify as very serious. However, my Lords, that is not the case since the last government passed the 2023 regulations, which defined serious disruption and some commentators would say diluted the concept of serious disruption.

So what is my noble clause? My new clause 378B do in plain terms? Well, it places on the face of the act all the illustrative examples and the interpretative test introduced in the Public Order Act 1986. Serious disruption to the life of the community regs. Now those regulations, as I suggested, make amendments to provisions in the Public Order Act of 1986 concerning the meaning of expression, serious disruption to the life of the community. Section 12 of the act gives the police a power to impose conditions on people organising and taking part in public processions.

Senior senior police officer can exercise this power. If the reason you believe that a procession may result in serious disruption to the life of the community, serious disruption to the life of the community is not defined in the act itself. But subsection two of section 12 sets out a non-exhaustive list of examples which may constitute serious disruption. Now, the 2023 regulations refines that list of examples which may constitute serious disruption, and the amendments to these subsections also provide that.

When considering whether a public procession in England and Wales may result in serious disruption, a senior police officer must take into account the disruption that may occur, regardless of whether the procession is held, as well as the disruption that may result from the procession, and may take into account the cumulative disruption that may be caused by more than one public procession or public assembly in the same area. The amendments provide that the term community extends to anyone who may be affected by the public procession, regardless of whether they live or work in the vicinity of a procession.

It states that disruption of is anything which is more than minor, in particular the making of a journey or access to goods and services. The regulations define access to any essential goods or any essential services, and it includes access to the supply of money, food, water, energy or fuel, a system of communication, a place of worship, a transport facility, an educational institution or a service relating to health. So, my Lords, that's what the regulations actually say in redefining the meaning of serious disruption to the life of the community in the main act.

And my amendment, although it looks complicated, it simply suggests that those regulations should now be incorporated into the bill as primary legislation and transferring the regulations to the face of the bill brings, I believe, legal clarity. The police, courts and organisers will read the statutory test directly from the act, rather than from a separate Statutory Instrument, reducing uncertainty about where the operative tests are located. It mirrors the stated purposes of the regulations to provide greater clarity, and I believe it brings consistency of application.

Putting the tests in primary legislation reduces the risk of interpretive divergence between different sources or guidance, and makes the threshold for imposing conditions more visible to Parliament and the public, and the cumulative effects are preserved. The clause can and should reproduce the regulations treatment of cumulative effects, so that multiple impacts are properly captured, as a regulations already complicate it. Contemplate cumulative assessment. So of course, the noble Lord, the Minister, may say or will say that embedding illustrative samples in primary law makes future policy adjustments harder, and may require primary legislation and time to respond to unforeseen operational guidance.

However, my Lords, I suggest that retaining my new clause as drafted to ensure secure clarity and parliamentary oversight, but at a short delegated powers safeguard power to make a power to change it in future regulations would be perfectly OK. My Lords, I wanted to comment briefly on amendment three, six, nine and the pyrotechnics of protest. I support my noble friend on the frontbench, my noble friend Lord Davies of Gower amendment, but I do not think it goes far enough. My Lords, I can't think of any lawful excuse for possessing pyrotechnic articles while taking part in a protest.

Protests are a vital part of our democratic life. They're a place for voices to be heard, for grievances to be aired, and for change and for change to be sought. But they're not a place for voices that can cause panic, injury or irreversible escalation. Pyrotechnics are designed to startle, to burn, to explode, to smoke. They're not tools for peaceful protest, persuasion to allow a defence based on an honestly held political belief, risks turning lawful protest into a dangerous theatre of risk and fear. I believe public safety must be paramount, and there are a few other things I could say about pyrotechnics at protests, but I will cut short my remarks in the interest of time.

But I see no justification whatsoever for anyone to have pyrotechnics at any protest, and for a lawful defence for it. But I beg move my amendment. Yes.
17:12
Lord Hogan-Howe Portrait Lord Hogan-Howe (Crossbench)
-
-
I rise to support. >> I've had my name to amendment 382H. But I also support the amendments of Lord Davies of Gower amendments of Lord Davies of Gower and it's based really on the concerns and the consequences of the Ziegler case. It's not for me, although people have mentioned it today to say that it was wrong in law, but the policy consequences for policing the streets of this country have been profound and I would say negative, particularly in the area of public protest and disorder policing.

The Ziegler case was about one of the simplest offences to prove in the criminal law. It was an offence of obstruction of wilful obstruction of the highway, and really there are only three parts to prove. It was wilful, it was obstruction and you were on a highway. That was the offence. It's been one of the simplest that we've all policed over the years. It only became complex when people alleged their obstruction of the highway is for a reasonable excuse, for which read A political purpose.

All the police need to prove in the past was that it was a highway, and that's well established in law, and it's been obstructed, and usually that the police have asked someone to move on and they've either returned or they didn't move. That was about as complicated as it was. But as soon as you have to import intent, recklessness or reasonable excuse, then the offence starts to become more complex. And the police do have to think carefully before intervening. Now, I know that sometimes people talk in this house about the police being careless of the law and actually being reactive and reactionary.

I'm not talking about an individual, I'm just as a general comment, it can be said that my experience has been that on the whole, they try and get it right, balancing the rights of everybody, often in very difficult circumstances. Now, my reading of Ziegler was that this, the Supreme Court seemed to say that the the dealing with obstruction of the highway is far too simple when dealing with protesters. It was OK for everybody else. But when you've got protesters, it got a little more complicated.

And the Supreme Court ruled that the exercise of convention one and three, rights to freedom of expression and freedom of assembly and association, sometimes grouped together as freedom to protest or the right to protest, constituted a lawful excuse, which means that before a person may be convicted for obstructing the highway, the prosecution must prove that a conviction would be a proportionate and unjustified interference with that person's convention rights. Now, the Ziegler judgement has caused very real difficulties for police in dealing with environmental protests and many other protests, and I would argue, for judges attempting to run trials fairly and efficiently, and to instruct juries about what must be proved.

Now, of course, in a courtroom or occasionally in this chamber, this discussion can produce many hours of pleasure. But in producing laws, we do have to consider the officers who have to apply them and the circumstances in which they do so. When policing protests, officers are often outnumbered. In fact, if they outnumbered the protesters, they are accused of intimidatory behaviour. The protesters believe sincerely and passionately in their cause, and that the only people preventing them from achieving their aim are the police, although in all cases I would argue it is preferable the police make the interventions in this challenge rather than the people on the other side of the argument or the general public, because quite often members of the general public are offended not by the cause of the protesters, but by their methods which they can the members of the public can believe to be a nuisance.

So it's better that probably the police deal with this, rather than everybody who's got quite emotive about the situation at the time. I'm afraid not all protesters are sober, reflective and balanced in their views or behaviour. And more and more the police have recorded in every aspect of their decision making. I don't think that's a bad thing. It's just the way that life has progressed yet in the middle of this volatile situation, the officer is now expected to weigh up the rights of the protester against the rights of the citizen, to go about their life in their usual way.

In my view, this has led to senior police officers allowing sit down protests to continue because there's an alternative route for traffic. You might remember there was a ship built in Oxford Circus at one stage, and it stayed there for weeks. And I was it was it's one of these things when we're no longer in the roles that we we were involved with. You wonder why the heck has not somebody not moved the ship? You're left wondering, how did it get there? Does somebody bring it on the tube? But if we if we put that to one side, we've had protests outside mosques.

We've had actually services outside mosques where it was said that there were too many people in the place of worship and they had to block the street. I don't think that was accurate, but that's what happened. So we've had various examples where the police have tried to balance these rights, but actually, I think being left in rather a confused position now, sometimes exercise of police discretion is reasonable if the impact on the local community is minimal, or the Bishop of Manchester mentioned.

Sometimes there are some very serious disruptions which you all accept. Remembrance day religious parades I would point out that in Liverpool, which he mentioned in passing, that the Orange Day parade wasn't always part. It had various aspects, many of which were very violent, I'm afraid, over the years. So sometimes some of these things do have to be looked at in a slightly a different way, but it does leave the police having to worry about whether ambulances and fire brigade can get through, rather than the protester worrying about their criminal liability and preventing emergency service access.

For me, the impact of this decision has been paralysing for senior officers and in turn, for officers on the ground who are dealing with protests. There have been criticised for not taking action on what I would say is the most blatant of obstructions. I have given a couple of examples or the most intimidating behaviour. I think the genuinely trying the best to balance human rights, the rights of the protesters to protest and the rights of everyone else to enjoy their life uninterrupted. But they can't always do that easily.

When faced by protesters. I would just mention in passing, I mentioned it last week that the Human Rights Act has a preamble which mentions human human responsibilities. Everybody forgets it now. There is no enforceability to it. Our rights, our responsibility to each other to maintain a good society and the positive things we all ought to be doing for each other. And I think there is something in this when thinking about how protests have concerned not only their own rights, but the rights of other people to enjoy their privileges and their rights while just enjoying the life now.

Lord Sentamu centre Sentamu. I'm sorry. Thank you. I'm sorry and I apologise. I couldn't quite pronounce it. What happens if the police get it wrong? Well, what happens is that generally the protesters can go to civil law. They can ask for injunctions, they can go to criminal law if the officers have breached the law. So there are remedies that are available. I think at the moment what's happening is that we're all losers, and I think it does need to be remedied. I take Lord Pannick point that it may be the Supreme Court on a couple of occasions have tried to, you know, give better clarity.

The problem for the cops is that they don't easily understand how the the Supreme Court decisions and judgements pan out. And that's why we have law, is to articulate in law what the Supreme Court has sometimes made clear to themselves, but does not always make clear enough for the officers on the ground and the fight that they needed to remedy. It indicates perhaps there is a gap in the law that the government might want to remedy now. And I think this is the great opportunity to produce clarity, which I argue that amendment 382 provides.
17:20
17:22
Lord Murray of Blidworth Portrait Lord Murray of Blidworth (Conservative)
-
-
I find myself in complete >> I find myself in complete agreement with the noble Lord Lord Walney, and in particular draw attention to the excellent work of attention to the excellent work of Professor Eakins and politics change in this area. As the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, observed in his opening remarks on in respect of amendment 382, H. It's plain that the Supreme Court took a wrong turn in the Ziegler case. Noble Lord Lord Pannick notes that a number of subsequent cases have touched on the finding in Ziegler and come to an apparently inconsistent conclusion, the most notable of those being DPP and Kerkorian, the Bristol.

The Bristol Colston statue case, the. As the noble Lord Lord Walney observes the Court of Appeal in that case found that the Ziegler judgement prominently spilled over had prominently spilled over into trials concerning criminal damage, and the Court of Appeal, in its criminal context, made clear that the defence of lawful excuse was not available in that context, and that sits uneasily with the Supreme Court's findings in Ziegler. The noble Lord Lord Pannick has the permanent member of the bar.

That he is says, well, the the law is tolerably clear, and it should survive it with the embellishments of the subsequent cases. But I am afraid in this context, for the reasons so ably set out by the noble Lord Lord Hogan-Howe, that is not adequate for the purposes of either the protesters or the police. And in my submission, amendment 382H is a model amendment in that it is clear and brief, and it sets out with admirable clarity what it is to do.

And in particular, I would draw the House's attention to the fact that it applies across the gamut of all offences which contain a lawful excuse provision for a. As you will see, the use of the words the the excuse must be a lawful excuse, or that it must be a reasonable one. And there are many across the canon in the area of those bits of the criminal law which we engaged in protest, which may give rise to this.

Thus the application of this amendment would be wide ranging and provide considerable clarity. It also, in Subclause two, sets out when it is no excuse, and it does so with great clarity. And I submit that the various judges trying these cases will be greatly aided, both when making decisions in summary offences and when giving directions to juries on this area in light of this amendment, and furthermore, finally in Subclause five, this amendment directly addresses the provision in the Human Rights Act, which takes into account whether or not this is a the exercise of a qualified right, and provides that this provision is necessary in a democratic society, and it therefore sits happily with the human rights arrangements so ably highlighted by the noble Lord, the Minister, in his closing speech in the last group.

So for those reasons, I very much hope that this amendment is brought back on report and I, for one, will heartily support it.
17:25
17:27
17:28
Lord Leigh of Hurley Portrait Lord Leigh of Hurley (Conservative)
-
-
My Lords, I rise to support the amendment.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

But I speak to a point that comes up in amendment 378B because it arises in three, seven, eight B I'm raising it now, but it does affect the subsequent amendments in affect the subsequent amendments in the next few groupings, particularly the amendments, my amendments going forward. And it amendments going forward. And it all flows from section 12 of the Public Order Act of 1986. Essentially, there is quite some concern that so much discretion is going to be left to the police.

It's clear that for one reason or another, the police have not been effective in controlling the protesters to date. All your Lords may have seen the video clip on social media showing Gideon Falter, the CEO of the Campaign Against anti-Semitism, being told by police he was quite openly Jewish and therefore causing a breach of the peace. We are in the middle of assessing the appalling decisions by the West Midlands Police, who consulted a large number of mosques, including some very radical ones, who house an imam who stated that women should not leave their home without their husbands permission.

And these people were consulted about whether or not Israeli tourists should be allowed to visit West Midlands. They claimed that they had consulted the Jewish community in the area. That was not true. It's clear that they realised that the Israeli tourists would be in danger, but they decided to ban them from coming on the false excuse that they would be the aggressors. So they turned the victims into the guilty ones. The Lordships may have seen another video clip on. I think it was Friday night or maybe Sunday night outside a restaurant in Notting Hill called Miznon, which is an Israeli owned restaurant.

There were some very aggressive and intimidating protesters and the police simply stood there. I think there may have been one arrest, but that was it. So innocent employees, eaters, diners, members of the public faced a very unpleasant situation. One can only hope that the Chief Constable, Guildford, leaves his post soon. But meanwhile, I would remind your Lordships that these clauses are all to amend the Public Order Act 1986. It was written a long time ago, and section 12, which empowers the senior police officer, who is defined as the most senior in the rank of the police officers present at the scene.

He or she is empowered to make the decisions about these protests, and there is some unease from some people about that, giving them that power. So I'd ask the noble Lord Minister to reflect if that is still the appropriate person to make the final decision, given the recent behaviour of some very small minority, but some police officers, to give them the total, total

**** Possible New Speaker ****

discretion on taking action. Yeah. My Lord. I'm very.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

I'm very. Grateful to the. noble Lord. For raising. The issue of Miss Nona.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

The issue of Miss Nona. In Notting. Hill. That protest, and has been a number of protests outside that restaurant, actually on my street. And they owners of that restaurant
17:31
17:32
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames Portrait Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (Liberal Democrat)
-
-
Yeah. going to confirm what I say to a few points on a few of the speakers few points on a few of the speakers we've heard from. I'm bound to say that I found myself in considerable agreement with the general concerns about violence expressed by the right reverend Prelate, the Bishop of Manchester, and it does seem to me that in some of the consideration of these clauses, we've lost sight of what we agreed at committee last week, and everybody agreed that the questions for courts and others about considering breaches of public order law do raise, and about the introduction of new public order provisions, raise the question of balance between the right to protest on the one hand, and the rights and freedom freedoms of others.

On the other hand, my Lords, I will resist the temptation to respond in detail to the amendments of the noble Lord Lord Blencathra, in spite of his claim that he demolished or he relished the noble Lord, the Minister's demolition of my arguments about stress testing this legislation about against the future and not confining them to the benign intentions of this government. I have concerns about the amendments of the noble Lord Lord Blencathra. I'm sure the noble Lord, the Minister, will deal with them.

They include the question of what is or is not serious, disruption of what should or should not amount to essential services within the meaning of the act. And about the whole question of cumulative disruption, to which we'll turn later. And I want to say that those concerns and the speech in the last group of the noble Lord, the Lord, the noble Lord, the Minister on the review and the publication of the review of Lord Macdonald of River Glaven, raise an important issue about the timing of this legislation as compared to the timing of the McDonald's expected report, and I share the confidence that he will consider all these issues with with great care.

But I raise the question as to whether it might not be better, have been better had the review come first and the introduction of this legislation and its consideration in this House comes second here, I take it from what the noble Lord, the Minister, said in his speech on the last group that it is the government's intention to give further consideration to public order law in the light of the report, which is expected from the noble Lord Lord Macdonald of River Glaven.

If that is the case, and if that attention will be given objectively and carefully, then and then lead to such legislation as is necessary, that may be the best we can do with the timing that we have now. And I take it from what the noble Lord, the Minister said at the end of the last group that that is the government's present intention. But my comments about the order in which this has been done stand. I turn next to the speech of the noble Lord Lord Hogan-Howe.

I don't propose to give him many hours of pleasure in listening again to arguments about balance as a matter of law, but I do raise the question raised by the noble Lord, Lord Leigh of Hurley, about how far his confidence that police officers and senior police officers always get the balance right, when that is a difficult assertion to make or defend. I'm not suggesting he went as far as that, but I do say that it is very important not only for government, but for us as parliamentarians to consider the possibility that police officers do sometimes fail to get the balance right.

And I take the point that Lord Hogan-Howe made, that it is often a very difficult balance to strike, and we need to be very careful in commenting on how they should strike it in not placing too much confidence in the police in the future, and in the event of in particular of changes of government, that, as the noble Lord recognised, might be unwelcome to many of us, but nevertheless there could be changes of an elected government. My Lord, that brings me to amendment 382 H, which has had a welcome from Lord Murray of Blidworth and which was elegantly presented, if I may say so, by the noble and learned Lord Lord Fuller noble Lord Lord Faulks the problem that I just wish to draw attention, the attention of the house to, is that Subclause five is effectively not simply a definitional section, but it is it.

It is designed to act and would act in some sense as an ouster for the purposes of domestic courts, of the effect of the convention rights, because it uses the language of article 11 in subclause five, which I'll read for the purposes of the Human Rights Act 1998, this section must be treated as necessary in a democratic society for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others. Article 11 requires that the rights that are respected are rights that are necessary and democratic society for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.

And if Parliament legislates that a section must be treated as necessary, it precludes within this jurisdiction any testing of the proposition that such provisions as interpreted are necessary in a democratic society for the protection of the rights and freedoms and others, and that is the province of the European Court of Rights to consider, and it is a requirement in the Human Rights Act. I'll give way at the end of the sentence, if I may. It is a requirement of the Human Rights Act that domestic courts here give effect to the European Convention and interpret legislation where

**** Possible New Speaker ****

they can, as compatible with the more. Thankful to the. noble Lord giving way.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Of course. This is an amendment so the government will not have given the government will not have given the certification of compliance with the European Convention. Were the noble Lord Lord Hanson to accept the amendment and it become part of the bill? The government could then the bill? The government could then certify that it did comply with the European Convention, and it would be unnecessary to put that particular provision in. But as an amendment, it is making clear the fact that that particular provision takes into account the fact that there are convention rights and notwithstanding those convention rights, the particular amendment is to have the effect that it does.

My Lord, that's a complicated justification of that. The inclusion of that subclause in the amendment. I do just about understand what the noble Lord Lord Faulks is saying there. But were his amendment to be passed, then that does raise difficulties about the the compliance of or the cohesion of that amendment. Were it to pass into law with the European Court or the European Convention of Human Rights. And I leave the point there. It's for the noble Lord, the Minister, to deal with it.

If he says will, he can accept the amendment, subject to later adjustment, to take out that subclause so be it.
17:41
Lord Hanson of Flint Portrait Lord Hanson of Flint, The Minister of State, Home Department (Labour)
-
-
I'll try, my Lords, to respond to what has been a a wide but at the same time restricted debate, if that makes sense, to noble Lords today. The amendments principally deal with reasonable excuse defences applicable to various public order and criminal damage related offences and the amendments related offences and the amendments moved by the noble Lord Davies of Gower 369A and 369B, which had the support of, amongst others, Lord Walney and other members speaking today, would exclude a political belief from being considered as a reasonable excuse or good reason under the new offences.

In clauses one, two one and one two, two. Now my view is that this would narrow the scope of the statutory defences and reduce flexibility for the police, the Crown Prosecution Service and the courts to consider individual circumstances, particularly given the political belief is a broad and loosely defined concept and not a term commonly used in legislation, and the lack of clarity, I think, could create uncertainty in its application. They would also, in my believe, would have wider operational implications by prescribing what cannot constitute a defence.

The amendments limit the discretion of the courts, the CPS and the police to make case by case judgements. Now this is important, my Lords, because it could restrict the operational independence of the police, the prosecutors and the judiciary who must weigh factors such as motive and proportionality when deciding to take enforcement action or to prosecute. Now, I know that goes to the heart of the amendments that the noble Lord has brought forward, but the government considers that the current provisions are sufficient and proportionate, and the defences as drafted ensure that enforcement and prosecutions, prosecution decisions are made proportionately and in line with the important human rights legislation and obligations that we adopt and accept.

Now. Amendment 369 AA would in the name of the noble Lord Blencathra and I thank him for his comments. Remove the good reason. Defence in clause one two, two I would simply say to the noble Lord that this defence is intended to cover circumstances which are also important, and those circumstances are. For example, it could be that someone needs to climb on a specified memorial to repair or to clean it, and we should not be criminalising people in such circumstances. But the acceptance of that amendment would mean that were, in theory, the case.

Amendment 382D in the name of Lord Davis of Gower, seeks to remove also the reasonable excuse defence available to individuals charged with specific offences under the Public Order Act 23 and section one, three seven of the Highways Act 1980, and these offences include locking on to an object, tunnelling or interference with key national infrastructure. Again, the government is of the view that the reasonable excuse defence is necessary in these instances to ensure it provides an appropriate balance between protecting the wider community and the right to protest.

Now, amendment 382 H. Tabled by the noble Lord Foulkes and also supported by name by the noble Lord Godson and in speech by the noble Lord Hogan-Howe, today, similarly seeks to extend the limit to the application of lawful or reasonable excuse defences in the public order context. Now the amendment would provide that any such defence would not cover conduct which is intended to intimidate, provoke, inconvenience or otherwise harm members of the public by disrupting their freedom to carry on a lawful activity or conduct designed to put people or property at risk or loss of damage.

And Lord Murray of Blidworth also supported that proposal. Now, as with the comments I've made on amendment 382 D, the government is not persuaded that this amendment is needed. Public order offences have been developed to ensure that there is reasonable excuse. Defences apply only when appropriate and respected. The need to balance the right to protest with the ability of the police to manage potential disruption to communities and to unlawful behaviour. An amendment 382 b from the noble Lord Davies of Gower seeks to amend the operation of the wilful lawful excuse requirement under section five of the Criminal Damage Act 1971.

That requirement, I hope I can be helpful by explaining that the requirement is part of the various offences of criminal damage. It's already limited so that a person is only automatically treated as having a lawful excuse under two specific circumstances. The first is that the defendant honestly believes that the person who was entitled to consent to the damage has given consent, or would have consented if they knew of the circumstances. Now, that might seem a very convoluted, but for example, my Lords, it could be the honest belief that the owner of a car in which a child was locked in on a hot day consented or would have consented to the defendant smashing the window to get the child out.

That's an example I just wish to place before the committee. The second is if the defendant acts to protect their own or someone else's property. For example, a person damages one person's property while accessing the property to prevent another fire. Again, they are limited sections, but I think it does give reas reason to whether the person's belief in those circumstances is reasonable or justified. It just needs to be honest. And I don't doubt that noble Lords would think the actions I explained in those circumstances would be entirely within the realm of lawful excuse.

Now, amendment 382 B seeks, first of all, to limit the lawful excuse defence in cases where a person's actions intend to intimidate, harass or inconvenience or harm people. And as the law currently stands, there is no suggestion that someone could have a lawful excuse to damage property, and if they did so with the intention to intimidate, harass or harm another person. The excuse, after all, has to be lawful. It is difficult to think of a scenario where damaging property with such malicious intent would fulfil this criteria, and in addition, the amendment seeks to supply the lawful excuse defence in cases where someone has honestly or sincerely held belief, irrespective of the nature of the belief.

The amendment then states that any belief must be honestly held and reasonable. I would suggest to noble Lords that these two provisions are at odds with each other, and would only add uncertainty to the operation of the law. And finally, the amendment seeks to ensure that there can be no lawful excuse for criminal damage committed in the course of public protest. My Lords, the right to freedom of association is a fundamental cornerstone of our democracy. Along with the right to free speech, the law does not allow wanton criminal damage in furtherance of political aims and the law.

Excuse requirements have been carefully crafted to ensure this, so it applies in specific circumstances that I've outlined already. Now the noble Baroness Cash and other noble Lords have mentioned the incident in North London recently, with protests outside a restaurant. Again, I just say with, I hope, helpful clarity to the noble Baroness that the potential offences of harassment or inciting violence may or may not have been applicable in that case, but it is for the police on the ground to make a judgement about what action they wish to invoke in that circumstance.

And I don't wish to second guess the police at this particular point on those issues, but the potential is there for complaints and others to be made to the police if any of those offences were taken. I also, if I may say, just in relation to the noble Lords that have mentioned the question of good reason. Defence at section one one, two, two a good reason covers unforeseeable offence, such as, for example, the removal of a flag that has been inappropriately put in a site, but where the person may not have had the permission of the owner at the time, and there is also and the right reverend Prelate mentioned this about the definition of serious disruption, serious disruption to the life of a community is set out in sections 12 to A of the Public Order Act 1986.

There is clarity in what serious disruption means and again, a judgement is made on issues like Remembrance Sunday or like wakes or religious festivals where, although there may be serious disruption, it is not in the spirit of the legislation to date, and as to date there have been, I can't think of a handful of occasions whereby the Public Order Act 86 has been invoked in the case that the no. Right reverend Prelate mentioned, or indeed Remembrance Sunday, then I hope that the legislation has stood the test of time.

And that goes again to the points of the Lord. Leigh of Hurley mentioned in his comments. To date, the Court of Appeal has already held that the only circumstances that are relevant are those that relate to the circumstances of damage or destruction, not to broader political matters. The political beliefs of those protesting, for example, are not to be taken into consideration when the offence has occurred. The relevant belief must be held by the defendant at the time of the event, and it must be that the owner consented or would have done so at the time, rather than as a result of the damage.

And finally, if I may, amendment 378B in the name of the noble Lord, Blencathra seeks to amend sections 12 and 14 of the Public Order Act to reintroduce the more than minor definition of serious disruption from the Public Order Act of 1986 and regulations of 23, which were quashed by the Court of Appeal in May 25th. Following the judicial review, the noble Lords have referred to, the government has acknowledged the finding of the court and considers the cumulative disruption provision as provided for in Government Amendment 372, to be a proportionate response.

To provide the police with the powers they need. All of which, again, when I say this to the noble Lord Marks and indeed the noble Lord Faulks who anticipated, I may say this subject to consideration by the review by the noble Lord MacDonald of River Glen, as part of his review. We've also had some discussion, but I just want to touch on briefly about the term occupier. Is that to cover memorials which are not just statues, but which are buildings, you know, for example, like halls of memory? The terms owner occupier take their usual legal meaning, whereby the occupier may be in possession of the memorial or the land on which the site is positioned, but not the legal owner.

For example, a tenant who has permission to use the land on which memorial is situated and has responsibility for maintaining the memorial. Some statues are privately owned, where the statue is on public land, there may not be a clear owner occupier could, for example, be a local authority in that case and the defences would cover, for example, a contractor appointed by the owner to clean and repair a memorial to climb on the memorial for those purposes, and under the clause one, two, two memorial means building or other thing erected or installed on the land for which has a commemorative purpose.

I also just want to touch briefly, if I may, on the point that the noble Lord de Mauley made, which we will come on to later in further consideration. But it is important that we examine what a war memorial is, and the position of the war memorial is that we've listed the ones down here, because they are ones that are currently listed buildings in listed grade one memorials, those 25. And that is why the Home Secretary has added the Winston Churchill statue in Parliament Square.

On and above that. But I think that that is the reason why they are those specific war memorials. But I will happily again return to that in a later consideration. Further on in the bill, the memorial refers to publicly accessible structures on a site of national significance that has a commemorative purpose. Initially, this has included the 25 war memorials designated as grade one listed by Historic England, such as the Cenotaph and Royal Artillery Memorial. The scope has been expanded for the statue of Winston Churchill in Parliament Square.

Because we've seen demonstrations there, the Home Secretary has also publicly committed this will include the National Holocaust Memorial, to shortly be built in Parliament Square, and the National War Memorial. And that's the initial designation. There's a very strict criteria, but that can be reviewed in due course, and I hope that the review by Lord MacDonald may well assess further whether those powers existing, as in section in the 1986 act, are still fit for purpose. If there's any recommendations, as I've said out of the Lord MacDonald review, the government will consider them and there will be further opportunities potentially, if we agree to legislate at a later date, but not within this bill.

And on that basis, I would invite the noble Lord Davis in what has been an interesting complex. Sorry, I'll

**** Possible New Speaker ****

just take the noble Lord Pannick. Grateful to the noble Lord as always, he responded to the noble always, he responded to the noble Lord, Lord Lee and the noble Baroness, Baroness Cash, in their Baroness, Baroness Cash, in their concerns. Understandable concerns about the protests outside the about the protests outside the Israeli owned restaurant in Notting Hill. And his response was that this is a matter for the police. this is a matter for the police. Does the government have no position on whether it is acceptable for people who are dining in an Israeli owned restaurant to be subject to abuse and intimidation of the sort that we have seen on London streets?

**** Possible New Speaker ****

I hope the noble Lord didn't take my comments in that vein. It is completely unacceptable for individuals to have their lives disrupted by that level of protest. disrupted by that level of protest. But it is for the police on site. I wasn't there on site at the night. wasn't there on site at the night. I haven't witnessed the protests. I've read about the concerns prior to today and I during the course of to today and I during the course of this debate, I have examined again the reports that have occurred, but it is for a police officer on site to determine because under existing legislation there are offences of harassment, there are offences of inciting violence and there are other offences.

And as the noble Lord knows, because we have debated in the Second Reading, there are measures in this bill to ensure that people can, with the police, determine a protest route and regularity of protest as part of the proposals in this legislation. So I'm not asking the question. I think it is important that people have the right to live their lives in freedom to enjoy a restaurant meal, but I cannot be the police on the night. Determining whether the offences that are potentially covered currently by law, are exercised by the police, and I hope the noble Lord will accept that as as the comments that I've made.

But with that, I'd invite the noble Lord to withdraw the amendments as proposed, or revisit them, if

**** Possible New Speaker ****

should he so wish. My Lords. I'm grateful to all noble Lords who have spoken in this debate, and who have spoken in this debate, and indeed to those who have supported my amendments and those noble Lords, my amendments and those noble Lords, even where they disagree with the amendments, because this discussion has laid down the real issue before has laid down the real issue before us. Who decides where the limits of protest lie? Parliament or the
17:58
Lord Davies of Gower Portrait Lord Davies of Gower (Conservative)
-
-
protest lie? Parliament or the courts? Much of the criticism rests on the claim that removing reasonable excuse defences is somehow draconian. I profoundly disagree, and I'd say to the the right reverend Prelate, the Bishop of Manchester, and indeed to the noble Lord, Lord Marks of Henley on Thames, that peaceful protest remains fully protected. What these amendments address is not expression, but coercion, not persuasion, but disruption, not dissent, but deliberate lawbreaking, carried out in the expectation that the courts will excuse it after the fact.

That expectation is not hypothetical. It is precisely what flowed from the Supreme Court's judgement in Ziegler and I. I thank the noble Lord Lord Pannick for his interpretation of the law as it stands, and indeed to the noble Lord Lord Murray of Blidworth for his further clarification that decision. The Ziegler decision has encouraged protesters to view arrest as a tactical step, confident that they can later invoke proportionality, sincerity of belief and human rights arguments to defeat prosecution. And we saw this with the recent case whereby Just Stop Oil protesters threw powder paint at the historic Stonehenge.

They were acquitted, of course, on all counts. The result is uncertainty for the police, frustration for the public, and an erosion of respect for the law. But noble Lords may agree that the answer lies in better guidance or more nuanced drafting. But we have been down that road. The debate on Public Order Act 2023, particularly those led by the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes and my noble friend Lord Sharpe of Epsom, were an earnest attempt to clarify the law while retaining reasonable excuse defences.

Labour denied the opportunity to do so. The outcome has been complexity layered upon complexity, and still the courts are left to decide, case by case, whether obstruction, damage or intimidation was worth it. Given the cause advanced the amendments before the committee offer a cleaner solution, they remove the invitation to judicial moral balancing and replace it with clear rules set by Parliament. They say plainly that political belief does not justify criminal damage. The desecration of memorials, the use of pyrotechnics or the obstruction of the public highway and critical infrastructure.

And as for the repeated invocation of the European Convention on Human Rights, we should be honest with ourselves. The convention and the Human Rights Act that incorporates it have increasingly constrained Parliament's ability to respond to new forms of protest that are deliberately designed to maximise disruption. My Lords, this is ensuring about that the strongest, loudest and most disruptive do not prevail simply because they are willing to break the law and then litigate. In that sense, these amendments are a distinct and necessary corrective to the outcome of Ziegler.

Whether noble Lords agree that my amendments are the correct approach or not, what is evident is the unsustainability of the current position, and it's regrettable that the government does not accept my arguments and support my amendments in this group today. But on that basis, I suggest that we will return to this on report. But for now, I do beg leave

**** Possible New Speaker ****

to withdraw my amendment. Sir, your Lordships pleasure that amendment 369 be withdrawn. Amendment by leave withdrawn. That brings us to no question. Is it clause one, two, one stand part of clause one, two, one stand part of the bill. Opinion will say content, not content. The contents have it into clause one two, two, amendment into clause one two, two, amendment 369, double A in the name of Lord Blencathra not moved. Not moved. That brings us to amendment 369B Lord Davies of Gower not moved, not moved.

The question, therefore, is clause one two, two stand. Part of the Bill is that opinion will say content, not content. The contents have it. That brings us into after clause 122 amendment 370 Lord

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Davies of Gower. My Lords, I beg to move

**** Possible New Speaker ****

My Lords, I beg to move amendment 370 in my name. This amendment creates an offence for intentionally causing disruption to intentionally causing disruption to road traffic infrastructure, where the action in question affects multiple individuals or multiple individuals or organisations. My Lords, this amendment originates from the growth in recent years of protest designed to cause maximum disruption to further narrow ideological ends. Activist groups comprised of self organising, self aggrandising ideologies began to realise that by taking part in large scale obstructions that affected the law abiding public, they could get their causes into newspaper headlines and Twitter feeds.

The. The consequence was that groups like Just Stop Oil became household names through their disruptive tactics. They targeted the lives of everyday people, disrupting people's livelihoods and hampering the functioning of society. The most damaging of these protests has become the disruption to road traffic. Protesters set themselves on busy roads and grind traffic to a halt. People for jobs, emergency services were delayed and police time is wasted, and it is the public that ultimately must pay the price. In 2022, Just Stop Oil shut down the M25 for four successive days, causing more than 50,000 hours of vehicle delay to over 700,000 vehicles.

This cost the public over £700,000, and the cost to the Metropolitan Police was over £1.1 million. Despite 45 people engaging in the protest, only five organisers were arrested and held in custody. If we do not punish those who cause such obscene disruption, we are leaving the public vulnerable to further disorder. The government has taken forward several measures from our previous Criminal Justice Bill, including the provisions to ban possession of pyrotechnics at protests and new offence of concealing one's identity at a protest, and the prohibition on climbing unspecified memorials.

However, it is a shame there have neglected to carry forward this particular measure to prevent serious disruption on roads, avoiding prosecuting disruptive individuals ultimately comes at the expense of the public, and I hope the government can recognise this and will reconsider this amendment. My further two amendments in this group respond to a stark reality. We have seen successive waves of disruptive protests that have strained our communities, stretched the capacity of our police forces and left the public questioning whether the law is operating as intended.

It is abundantly clear that undue weight has too often been placed on the rights of disruptive activists at the expense of the rights, well-being and interests of the wider public. Take, for example, the recent Palestine related demonstrations. Metropolitan Police have stated that the cost of policing these protests in London between October 2023 and June 2024 were £42.9 million, yes, £42.9 million, 51,799 Metropolitan Police officers shifts and 9639 police officer shifts from officers, usually based outside the Metropolitan Police area, were required.

10,639 police officers have had rest days cancelled between October 2023. Sorry. I beg your pardon. That's 106,339. Police officers have had rest days cancelled between October 2023 and April 2024, all of which will eventually have to be repaid to those officers. And such demands on police capacity inevitably divert resources away from policing crime and protecting vulnerable communities. And it is against this backdrop that amendment 382 seeks to empower chief officers to act decisively by way of background. Currently, section 13 of the Public Order Act, 1986 permits the chief officer of police of a police force to apply to the local council for an order to prohibit the holding of all demonstrations in a particular area for a period of up to three months.

The threshold, as it currently stands, is that the Chief Officer of Police reasonably believes that the powers in section 12 of the act, that is, the power to impose conditions on protests, are insufficient to prevent serious public disorder. But this threshold of serious public disorder overlooks a number of further factors. It does not consider the potential for property damage, the impact on the rights of others not involved in those protests, nor the demands placed on police resources. So my amendment would replace subsection one of section 13 of the Public Order Act, 1986 to introduce the ability for the relevant chief officer to consider the risk of serious public disorder, serious damage to property, serious disruption to the life of the community, and undue demands on the police.

My Lords, there is precedent for this. Section 11 of the Public Processions Northern Ireland Act 1998 permits the police to prohibit processions if they believe that the protests would place undue demands on the police or military forces, and whilst recognised in the unique historical context of public processions and assemblies in Northern Ireland, there is no reason as to why, with modern protest tactics, police forces in England and Wales should not also be able to consider the cost and burden on the police imposed by the policing of the protest.

Now, turning to amendment 382, see the existing six day notice period for marches under section 11 of the Public Order Act 1986 simply is not fit for modern policing needs. When tens of thousands of officers must be mobilised at short notice to manage demonstrations that may span multiple days of locations and locations six days in advance. Notice does not provide sufficient time for intelligence assessment, resourcing and the engagement with organisers, so extending this to 28 days acknowledges the complexity and scale of contemporary protest events.

It is a proportionate adjustment that gives police forces the lead in their need without unduly restricting peaceful protest. I emphasise these amendments support peaceful, lawful expression which is a cornerstone of our democracy. They do not and are not intended to curtail genuine dissent. They do, however, ensure that in protecting the ability to protest, we do not trample the rights of those affected by serious disruption. My Lords, we are often reminded that the right to protest must be balanced with the rights of others.

And I put it to noble Lords that these amendments deliver that

**** Possible New Speaker ****

balance, and I beg to move. Amendment proposed. After clause

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Amendment proposed. After clause 122, insert the new clause printed on the Marshalled List. My Lords, I'd.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

My Lords, I'd. Like to rise to strongly support my noble friend on the front bench. My Lords, I think we grossly underestimate how much damage the UK economy is caused by stopping UK economy is caused by stopping motorways, particularly the M25. I've not seen authoritative figures for how much it costs to block a motorway, which happens to road traffic accidents. Years ago I saw
18:09
18:10
18:11
Lord Strasburger Portrait Lord Strasburger (Liberal Democrat)
-
-
respect, allowing, as it does for a protest to be banned because, in the opinion of a chief officer of the opinion of a chief officer of police, it would place undue police, it would place undue demands on the police. But my Lords Police, as a public authority, have a duty to facilitate protests, not a duty to facilitate protests, not prevent them. Of course, that duty to facilitate process protests has resource implications for the police. Sometimes serious implications. That means that the police must be provided with adequate resources by the government.

But it does not mean that as an alternative to proper resourcing, financial corners should be cut by the government, thus making it impossible for the police to carry out their duty to facilitate protest. But that is precisely what amendment 382 A would do. It says that protest should not be banned, should be banned, should be banned because the police are under resourced. It would be better if it said that the police must be sufficiently resourced to allow them to facilitate protest.

It doesn't. And for that reason, amendment 382 must be opposed. Turning to amendment 382C this seeks to extend from six days to 28. The notice period for informing police of a demonstration. But many demonstrations are spontaneous or are by necessity organised at short notice. In any case, my Lords, the amendment would appear to not achieve anything because this section of the bill already contains a provision for late notice as soon as practicable. So there's nothing to be gained by increasing the formal notice period, unless your goal is to make it ever more difficult to organise a protest.

My Lords, amendment 382C

**** Possible New Speaker ****

should also be opposed. Briefly comment on the issue of

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Briefly comment on the issue of notice periods for protest, because I get sympathy with the desire to create an ordered system where create an ordered system where there is more notice for protests. But I struggle to see how it how it could be practical in some ways.
18:13
18:14
Lord Hanson of Flint Portrait Lord Hanson of Flint, The Minister of State, Home Department (Labour)
-
-
I'm grateful to the noble Lord Davies of Gower for his amendments on amendment 370, seeking to update public order legislation. Let me, just for the benefit of any doubt, just for the benefit of any doubt, echo the words of the noble Earl Attlee that this is a serious disruption that can cause by protest tactics, key infrastructure, and I understand the difficulties and challenges that are met by those type of protests. Now, the amendment seeks to criminalise specifically acts that cause serious disruption to road transport infrastructure.

I would just say gently to the noble Lord that our view is that under the Public Order Act of 2023, section six. There is an offence already on the statute book of obstructing major transport works, and section seven makes it an offence to interfere with key national infrastructure, including roads and transport infrastructure, as defined by section eight of that act, introducing a new offence that closely mirrors existing provisions risks unnecessary duplication. It could create confusion for police and prosecutors, and it could add complexity where clarity is needed.

That doesn't take away the disruption that can be undertaken, and also even the minimal disruption occasionally, where an individual might be stopped by an ambulance, for example. Those are real key issues, but I would suggest to the noble Lords that existing legislation covers those proposals. Amendment 382 seeks to amend section 13 of the Public Order Act to enable the Chief Officer of Police to consider serious damage to property, serious disruption to the life of the community, and the demands on police resources when determining whether to apply for an order prohibiting public perception.

Processions. Section 13 of the 1986 act, already rightly sets a high threshold for considering whether public processions should be prohibitive. It is one thing to place conditions on protests, as provided by elements of the 1986 act, to enable them to take place peacefully and with minimum disruption. It's quite another to ban processions altogether, and I find myself at one with the noble Lord Strasburger on these matters, just so that on occasion I can reach out with the hand of friendship to him, as well as to other members of the House as well.

It's important that all public order legislation continues to be compatible with articles 1011 of the EC, and section 13 allows for the banning of a protest only where there is necessary to prevent serious public order and widening the scope of the power. I would suggest to include taking into account police resources, would risk undermining the right to peaceful protest and the legislation becoming incompatible with the obligations that we seek to maintain under the XR. And finally, amendment 382C again, I hope I hope he takes this in the best way possible.

But I agree with the noble Lord Strasburger again on these matters, that the requirement to increase planning processions from six days to 28 days, I think six days is a an adequate time for police to be able to. Determine whether process should occur. As the noble Lord Strasburger said, there are occasions where protests do flare up because of incidents that have occurred. Guidance to police already provides the necessary operational flexibility to allow forces to work with organisers, planning protests to ensure the conditions imposed are necessary and proportionate.

And I just have to say, regretfully to the noble Lord that increasing the statutory notice period is, I believe, unnecessary. Nor this is an important point. I think that sometimes I come to the Committee or to the House and say the police have requested matters, and that's why I'm bringing them forward. We've had no requests from the police themselves to look at the increase in the number of days from 6 to 28. Now, having said all of that again, and I know the House will become tired of this record that I'm playing during the course of this evening.

But all matters of public order legislation, the noble Lord Lord Macdonald of River Glaven, are matters that fall within the terms of reference of his review. If his review brings forward issues that need to be examined, we will examine them and again consider the findings and recommendations very carefully. But at the moment, with regret, because he's been so supportive this evening on some other matters, I have to say to the noble Lord Davies of Gower that I can't accept his amendments tonight, although I do understand both his and the noble Earl Lord Chartres references to the disruption these matters can cause, we believe it is covered by existing legislation.

I would therefore ask him to withdraw his amendment, but before I.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

I've been in your Lordships' House for 33 years. I've lost count House for 33 years. I've lost count of the number of times that Ministers said that an amendment is unnecessary, and I've used the same unnecessary, and I've used the same argument myself. But that being the case, how is it that we saw the M25

**** Possible New Speaker ****

being blocked? I, I've. Had I've had 30 years in

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Had I've had 30 years in Parliament, not all in this House, but I've had 30 years in Parliament and I've used it occasionally and I've had it used against me occasionally. That is the matter that it is unnecessary, given that we have had the legislation on the statute book to date. Now, again, he asks me the quite reasonable question how is it the M25 gets blocked? Now again, I put it down to him, this, this House, this government, this Parliament and any other parliament passes legislation.

It is not for Ministers to implement that legislation. It is for the local police and a local level to take a judgement on the legislation at that time. And in the cases there is legislation on the statute book, the police could exercise that legislation. They may or may not choose to do so because it may inflame the situation or not. It's a matter for judgement by the local police. But I just simply say to him that the amendment tabled today by the noble Lord Davis, are already in place, and it is for that reason I ask him to withdraw them.



**** Possible New Speaker ****

Lord Swire Lord Strasburger raise the issue of facilitating protests. And it's something that's often quoted, and it made me think, I don't know where that is. And I've just had a quick look. I don't think it exists. I think article 11 of the suggests that the police shouldn't inhibit public protests, and certainly shouldn't try to intimidate protesters, but that's different to making it sound as different to making it sound as though they are there to market protests or to actually be the ranges of protest.

So it achieves its aim. And I think the trouble is that the police have got into that mindset. They'd have to do everything to protect the protester. If you're not careful, forget the rest, I do. That's why I challenge you, not because I think it's badly intended. I don't think it's accurate in terms of XR.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

I will take that as a comment intervention for myself to reflect upon and for the noble Lord Strasburger to reflect upon. But I maintain the position. The police have a difficult job. Legislation have a difficult job. Legislation is in place currently, and the proposals brought forward would replicate that. And I'm trying to

**** Possible New Speaker ****

replicate that. And I'm trying to sit down, but I see the noble Lord Harper. So once again, I'll take an intervention. Very briefly. In the spirit of trying to be

**** Possible New Speaker ****

In the spirit of trying to be helpful in answering my my noble friend Earl Attlee, one of the things that was very helpful in my time at the Department for transport was that National Highways sought a pre-emptive injunction to set out certain behaviours that should be prohibited, were successful in getting it, and that was very effective at giving the necessary tools to the police to keep the

**** Possible New Speaker ****

motorway open. I'm grateful for that contribution from the noble Lord Harper, and could I add that into Harper, and could I add that into the mix of the debate today? But I still come to the conclusion that the existing legislation, however the existing legislation, however it is interpreted, is covered. And therefore I hope for the last time, as the noble Lord, to withdraw his amendments.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

amendments. My Lords, this has been a short debate, but I'm grateful to those that have contributed. And to my noble friend, for supporting my amendments. The police are charged not only with facilitating lawful protest, but also protecting the safety and liberties of all citizens. Yet the current legal framework, I suggest, often leaves officers with insufficient tools to intervene meaningfully before disruption becomes entrenched. Now, amendment three, a two strikes at the core of this problem by allowing chief officers to seek prohibition in defined circumstances, including with marches, are likely to cause serious disorder, damage, disruption or place undue demand on limiting unlimited policing resources.

And we align the law with operational reality and public expectations. So what do the public expect? Well, polling shows that large majorities support police intervention in protests. Scenarios that go beyond peaceful, lawful conduct. They reveal a public that very much distinguishes between legitimate expression and conduct that crosses into intimidation and disorder, and similarly, extending the the notice period to 28 days is a common sense enhancement that gives police and local authorities the time needed to prepare for large and potentially complex processions, and this is about ensuring the responsible ordering of protests in a way that protects public safety, minimises disruption and allows ordinary citizens to go about their lives.

My Lords, these amendments are a measured, evidence based response to the challenge of protests policing in the 21st century. I hear what the Minister says, the noble Lord, the Minister says, but I hope the government can give them some serious consideration. But for now I do beg

**** Possible New Speaker ****

leave to withdraw. Mr. This amendment be withdrawn. The amendment is by leave withdrawn after clause 122, amendment 378.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Lord Walney. My Lords, it's a pleasure to move 378 in my name and those of move 378 in my name and those of the noble Lords, Lord Pollock and Lord Goodman of Whickham. I also Lord Goodman of Whickham. I also tend to to speak to amendment 3718
18:25
18:26
Lord Walney Portrait Lord Walney (Crossbench)
-
-
remains an excellent set of recommendations which the government is entirely free to accept at any point. Notwithstanding the the the new review, which has been set up by Lord MacDonald of Glaven, which has already been mentioned a number of times by my the noble Lord, the Minister's colleague. Let me just pre-empt his response and enable him to give a slightly different response to his colleague, because he will say at the end, or he's probably gearing up to say at the end of this that we must all wait for Lord MacDonald to review his review, to conclude, and then wait and see.

After that, I just gently put it to the government that they have chosen not to do that themselves in one of the amendments that they have put forward on cumulative disruption. So if it is good enough for His Majesty's Government on that amendment, that is entirely within their power and proper to move on some of these other issues. While Lord MacDonald looks at the at the wider picture. So he's got about 45 minutes to make up his mind on that.

And I'm sure we'll see. I'm sure we'll see. It's probably a bit more. Let me let me try to be brief. Amendment 378 on extreme criminal protest groups. My Lords, this amendment would create a power for the Secretary of State by regulations to designate an extreme criminal protest group where the Secretary of State reasonably believes that the group's purpose, object or practice is the deliberate commission of imprisonable offences, including sabotage, criminal damage, obstruction of critical national infrastructure or serious public order offence in order to influence public policy or democratic decision making, and where those activities create a risk of serious harm to public safety, democratic institutions or the rights of others.

My Lords, this amendment is carefully framed. It makes it explicit that designate is not terrorist prescription and and and it would seek to restrict membership promotion, fundraising, organising and material support with proportionate penalties which are less than those that a proscribed terrorist group would would attract. And the. I think we can see a reason why this. This amendment, having this power available to the government would have been so valuable in recent years. And for that, we we should look at the example of Palestine action.

Now, there are deeply opposed views in this House on the on whether it was appropriate to designate Palestine action as a terrorist organisation. And it has divided the House. It is divided some of my friends with whom I usually agree with on the vast majority of issues, and it certainly would, would divide the country. But I put it to this House and the government that there would be a much greater consensus if it were if it had been available to the government to stop this organisation, which was avowed, avowed in its criminal and criminal attempt and carried out criminal operations for a period of five years before eventually having been seen to reach the the threshold, the terrorism threshold, and was and was designated.

I think I'm sure there will be members who speak against this now, but I just ask them to think, to to consider the views of the, I think would be the overwhelming majority of the public that yes, they might not agree that the the economic damage, primarily economic damage. And let's not forget that there are incredibly serious cases going through the courts at the moment involving the use of a sledgehammer, causing causing harm to a to a security guard.

But but largely economic damage that meets the definition of terrorism. It has it has not always it does not necessarily meet people's common perception of what a terrorist organisation does, which has largely been focussed on violent actions against individuals. But there would be an overwhelming support, I think, for for saying that, that an organisation which is dedicated to breaking the law to get its way, even if it is not designated terrorist, it should not be free to, to advertise, to, to recruit to, to live stream its crimes on social media at the time.

So this is a I put it to, to the government that this is a is is a genuinely common sense measure that when the next time that this occurs and this will happen again, it gives a tool for them to nip the activities in the bud and avoid the controversy, which has been a feature in having so many people unnecessarily in a inappropriately clogging up police time and the courts by making a protest against the against the terrorists and the the against the terrorists and the terrorist designation.

So. Let me then move to amendment 37. 1AAI will just speak briefly on this and allow the Lord to come in in due course. In, in. To expand with the substance. But this is a modest but important amendment to amend clause one, two, four so that where the the the bill refers to premises used for worship and extra protest against disruptive, intimidating demonstrations outside places of worship, that it would extend that to faith schools and faith community centres, which can clearly be in target from from the kind of deeply intimidating, inappropriate protests that are targeting the Jewish community at the moment but could absolutely be extended to other faith communities extended to other faith communities in in the future.

Amendment 378A is about the potential to place restrictions on inappropriate protest activity around buildings of democratic importance in the name of of minor noble Lord Lord Pannick would amend the Public Order Act to allow conditions to be imposed on processions, assemblies and one man protests where the the protest in the is in the vicinity of premises used for the purposes of democratic decision making or premises occupied by Member of Parliament for the purposes of their parliamentary duty, specifically where it may intimidate persons of reasonable firmness so that they are deterred from carrying from accessing those premises to to carry out their work.



**** Possible New Speaker ****

Now, this is not resolutely Minister apologies. This is just. No, not at all. I

**** Possible New Speaker ****

This is just. No, not at all. I just wanted to point out that you previous I'm sorry, this is a slightly delayed response, but I've just realised you're talking to 371 just realised you're talking to 371 EA. And I do realise that a lot of amendments in this group, and there has been some, some change in the has been some, some change in the groupings from the previous night's committee. Three seven, one A we are getting to a group six I believe not to interrupt your flow.



**** Possible New Speaker ****

believe not to interrupt your flow. Apologies, but I wanted to make that clear for committee. OK. So I. Will carry on.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

I will leave the clerks to unpick that mess. Forgive me. Does that mean we all have to stay incredibly late for three? For incredibly late for three? For Group six? It probably does, doesn't it? Yeah. Oh, good. That's doesn't it? Yeah. Oh, good. That's such great news. Right? Thanks for such great news. Right? Thanks for such great news. Right? Thanks for telling me. So on the 378A, this is not about shielding politicians from criticism is about ensuring that the, the elected representatives, that working people and members of the public can access democratic institutions and and that those who work in and around them can do so without, without the fear of intimidation.

And there is clearly a divide in this chamber on, on the kind of noisy, disruptive protest to which elected members and Parliament and are now with increasing regularity, exposed. I think it is really important that we draw a firmer line and the government sets the the lead in this in saying that engagement with the democratic process can actually be diminished by the kind of aggressive, angry protests which are implicitly can be a menace, a threat of implied force rather than an than an expression rather than freedom of expression and making people's view, making the views of individuals or groups to their elected representatives, for which there are a myriad of ways to to do in the advanced society that that we have.

Amendment 380 is related to the noble Lords of shadow Ministers. Previous set of amendments on cumulative disruption. This in the name of of my noble Lords, Lord Pannick, Lord Polak and Baroness and Baroness Foster, and this is the issue that builds on the government's own amendments to to put the. To put the principle of cumulative disruption more clearly. Interceptions 12 and 14 of the Public Order Act, which is welcome. It is it is being shown to be to be necessary by the the impact, the detrimental impact primarily on Jewish communities in since the the Gaza conflict, where many Jewish people have have felt intimidated in coming into central London and and and other places, other places by regular by regular marches.

And I've been beseeching the government and the police to do something about this, not to ban protests, but to strike a better balance so that they are able to go about their lives and not find themselves in the situation where if a protest group like the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign wants to organise a march in central London every Saturday, then effectively many, many Jewish people find that that area out of out of bounds. And so it's really welcome that the government has sought to strengthen the ability of the police to place conditions on those protests.

But amendment 380 is necessary because simply placing conditions which in in the Metropolitan Police's understanding of this, when myself and and other and members of the of the Jewish community and other peers discussed with them in in the thick of the protest, they were clear that that was simply about choosing one street rather than another. It was perhaps limiting the the time, but was did not give the ability to say, you know what? You've only been you've you've already been in London, in the centre of London on two Saturdays.

So you have to pick a different day that would or you have to give it a rest this Saturday, come back the Saturday after. That would require section 13 saying no to, well, recommending that the Secretary of State says no to to a march and therefore the the cumulative impact proposal from the government is is going to prove to be insufficient unless it is also extended to section 13, the ability on occasion to say no. And then. Finally and briefly because the because time is marching on and the issues had been has been raised in the previous amendment.

Amendment 3382E the cumulative impact on policing resources. At the moment, the police have no ability to factor in the huge drain on resources that weekly mass marches have been placing on them in ability to to regulate a protest, and therefore the. The bill is racking up to tens of millions of pounds, and that is bluntly being either placed on taxpayers at a time of increasing fiscal scarcity, or it is going to impact on other front line policing priorities.

And so, yes, absolutely, there is a right to protest in this country, but that right is is qualified and is balanced with other factors and, and an ability of the police to be able to factor in their own depleted resources in making decisions on particular repeat process I put to the government is absolutely proportionate, particularly in an environment where going out on the streets in mass numbers is probably not the most effective way of getting your view across anyway.

But that's I mean, that's a that's an entirely subjective judgement, but it's certainly only one of a myriad of ways in which we have the privilege in our liberal democracy to be able to get our views across to those who represent us. And ultimately, we can we can choose to change them every election if we

**** Possible New Speaker ****

wish. Amendment proposed after clause

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Amendment proposed after clause 122, insert the new clause printed on the Marshalled List opposing view, if you don't mind.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

view, if you don't mind. Oh, sorry. Do you want to go Lord Hutton?

**** Possible New Speaker ****

I just wanted clarification on three 700. Do I understand that in three 700. Do I understand that in his moving this amendment that if this had existed, but there would not have been any need to use terrorism laws to prescribe Palestine action?

**** Possible New Speaker ****

But my. My clear view on looking at this, admittedly from the outside, I've admittedly from the outside, I've had some access to the government's independent adviser on political violence for a number of years while this issue was being was being debated. But yes, my clear view on looking at this is that you would have been able to place a restriction on Palestine action restriction on Palestine action much earlier in the process, which would actually have stopped of being able to inhibit much of the criminal damage, but crucially, would have meant restrictions without without them getting before they got to the terrorism threshold.

And much of this controversy could have been avoided.
18:43
Baroness Blower Portrait Baroness Blower (Labour)
-
-
I, I have a number of amendments in this group, and I'm very grateful to my noble friend Lord grateful to my noble friend Lord Hain for having signed them. It it won't come, I think, as a great surprise to the noble Lord Lord surprise to the noble Lord Lord Walney, that I do have differences with with his presentation, the the amendments that I have represent a compromise rather than the stand part in the name of the noble Lady, Baroness Jones.

Although I have to say that stand part does have some attractions. The first of my is of my set of amendments is on the question of quotes in the vicinity. My Lords, when discussing a different bill in this House, the phrase in the vicinity was taken to mean ten miles. I imagine that's not the intention of this clause, but it is, my Lords, imprecise. I hope that many noble and learned Lords in the House might agree with me that precision in this aspect of the legislation would be helpful, and perhaps even necessary.

This is what amendments 30 seven one, A, C and E seek to address. Given that from all sides of the House, it's accepted that the right to protest should operate in a free, democratic and plural society such as ours. It behoves us, if we infringe on that right which this bill clearly does, that we do it with clarity in law. My apologies to the to the noble prelate, the Bishop of Manchester, but I think in this case, clarity would help.

Clarity, clarity in law so as to do the least damage to that. Right. Particularly as we, in my view, must always seek to protect the article 11 the right of freedom of assembly. So my amendment seek to ensure that in organising marches or processions and protests, both the organisers, from their point of view and the police given responsibility for maintaining order, should be clear about the parameters. And that's why I have specifically included 50m to ensure that there is clarity.

But also there's a debate about this. I would, of course, be open to a conversation with my noble friend about specific wording. I repeat, however, that clarity in defining much more closely what is intended by in the vicinity, I believe, is both appropriate and necessary to my other amendments 37 one, b, d and f I say this. The wording I propose is unambiguous in both accepting and promoting the proposition that the purpose of intimidating individuals accessing places of worship is unacceptable.

Once again, I propose wording which would have the effect of much greater clarity for the police and for all parties concerned. I have in my many years as an activist, protested about. I've had I've had a variety of causes that I've protested about, and I have used the right to protest extensively against apartheid in South Africa, which took many years of protest to achieve. I protested against the blockade of Cuba by the US government, and I've protested to reclaim the streets so that they're safe for women at night.

Neither of these yet has been achieved. And of course, I've campaigned for Palestinian rights on none of those occasions have I ever set out to intimidate individuals, whether accessing places of worship or in any other way, whilst accepting that non-violent direct action may sometimes be used. Personally, I believe in the force of argument rather than the argument of force. Many hundreds and thousands of protesters would say exactly the same. As I've said, the purpose of intimidating is clearly unacceptable, which is my why.

My amendments provide more appropriate wording to offer clarity to the police in the discharge of their duties. They would be on safer ground in determining whether a protest or march procession were designed with the purpose of intimidating individuals, accessing a place of worship to carry out religious activities or not. No noble Lord would support the deployment of such intimidation, I certainly wouldn't. However, the clause as it stands, widens the circumstances in which the police can impose conditions on protest, where it quotes may be intimidating to a person of reasonable firmness and quotes deter them from entering a place of worship.

In my estimation, this is a very low threshold and difficult for the police to determine. The amendment seeks to make it far clearer and less open to subjective interpretation, i.e. that there is an intention to intimidate and where people are deliberately prevented from entering a place of worship. There are many organisations with concerns about this bill, and they are supporting these amendments. This was made plain and public in the statement released yesterday and covered in the Guardian newspaper, from more than 40 civil society and religious groups.

More will be said, I'm sure, about this in relation to the cumulative impact aspect of the amendments to this this bill. At this stage, I simply remind your Lordships House that change requires persistence and repeated action. As with the farmers so warmly praised in this chamber for winning changes on tax by demonstrating, the Quakers who have signed the statement have first hand experience of the repression caused by other recent anti-protest legislation. In March 2025, the Metropolitan Police raided Westminster Quaker Meeting House and arrested six people who were planning non-violent protest.

Many Quakers, and indeed people of many faiths, have also been arrested for non-violent protests on issues such as climate change and Palestine. They point out that their ability to protest goes hand in glove with their ability to live in accordance with their own religious values of peace. I commend, therefore, consideration of these amendments as providing greater clarity and precision on the parameters for policing, protest and assemblies. In these circumstances. The point was made in the passage of previous legislation relating to protest, as it has been today, that that we defend the right to protest.

But defending the right is not enough. We have to avoid enacting legislation which can give rise to a chilling effect on that right to protest. I would welcome a conversation with my noble friend, the Minister, on these important issues and will, of course, listen closely to the Minister's response.
18:51
Lord Polak Portrait Lord Polak (Conservative)
-
-
My my Lords. Perhaps I should >> My my Lords. Perhaps I should just begin by agreeing with Baroness Blower about the promise, Baroness Blower about the promise, but I note that they didn't call to but I note that they didn't call to globalise the Intifada. I wanted to refer to to Lord Walney and to congratulate him, but actually to thank him for the work that he's done and continues to do on counter-terrorism. It is deeply appreciated by by many, and certainly from the Jewish community.

He's going to do as a leading non-Jew, a righteous Gentile, if I may add, for everything that the noble Lord does, and it is deeply grateful. So I added my name to amendment 307A, and I have 2 or 3. I've added 2 or 3 in this in this group. And supporting this amendment would ensure that those who are creating a risk of serious harm to public safety, democratic institutions and the rights of others are curtailed. This can include all sorts of groups and we know them all, and these groups can pose a clear and tangible threat to public order and public safety, even where their activities may not, in every instance, meet the statutory threshold threshold for terrorism.

The House will recall, for example, the incident in November 2023 when Just Stop Oil protesters obstructed an emergency ambulance with the blue lights flashing on on Waterloo Bridge, an action that plainly, plainly placed lives at risk. An amendment of this nature. 307 A would ensure that such groups, which demonstrably endanger the public and interfere with essential services, can be addressed at an early stage if they enable more timely and effective intervention. Where there is a sustained pattern of reckless, disruptive conduct before serious harm occurs.

On three amendment 370 AA my Lords, the term intifada is not a neutral expression, but one rooted in campaigns of organised violence and terrorism. Yet the government seemed to fail to understand or choose to ignore what intifada really was and what it truly means. My Lords, with tragic consequences. I look over at the Bishop of Manchester in Manchester on Yom Kippur, Heaton Park Synagogue, Melvin Kravitz and Adrian Dalby are no longer with us, and in Sydney might be the other end of the world.

But what went on there in the 15 innocent people who were murdered? This is a result where? Antisemitism can lead to these massacres. These people are the victims of the global so-called global intifada. And when the government and governments around the world do not heed the warnings about the severe and dangerous impact that these words have. My Lords, this is what happens. And this amendment, therefore, would can help to stop Manchester or Bondi Beach happening again and can provide clarity for the CPS enforcement and ensuring that Parliament draws a clear line before more lives are lost, rather than afterwards waiting until loss of life.

To act quite simply, is deeply shameful. Amendment 318. I added my name to my Lords. Just cannot be right in a free society that any community feels unable to go about its daily life because of repeated demonstrations, however lawful they may each be. This was starkly illustrated by the protest that took place the day after Manchester synagogue attack, when a traumatised community was given no space to grieve in such circumstances, managing or conditioning a process is not always enough.

The police must have some clear legal authority to prevent it going ahead. Where the cumulative effect tips into serious disruption and intimidation, and this amendment would provide that clarity and ensure the law properly protects both public order and the right of communities to live without fear. And I'd be very interested in the views of the noble Lord, the Minister on that. And finally, if I may, for 86, this amendment would address a serious problem in our framework for public funding.

SPOs most clearly, I guess, by the debacle surrounding the ban, MCA, which was permitted to retain a grant of £14,250 from the British taxpayer despite a catalogue of deeply troubling activity, including behaviour glorifying terrorism. And one of the band members held up a Hezbollah flag on stage, shouting up Commons up Hezbollah, my Lords, artistic and expression, of course, must be protected, but it must never be allowed to cross the line into incitement. And when it does, certainly public money should not be supporting it.

This incident demonstrates how ill equipped our current law is to prevent funds from flowing to individuals or organisations whose conduct runs directly counter to our values and our security. However, my Lords, the problem isn't just about MCA, an organisation funded by the UK taxpayer. The Collections Trust issued guidance referring to Hamas, of course, a proscribed terrorist organisation. As I quote, anti-colonial colonial freedom fighters. That language is not accidental or is it trivial? It legitimises and sanitises terrorism and it was disseminated with public funds.

So this amendment would make it clear that no organisation should be permitted to receive or retain taxpayer support if it promotes or excuses criminal conduct or narratives that undermine our democratic values. So again, I ask the Minister if he agrees that public money must never be used, directly or indirectly to legitimise extremism and Parliament. We here have a duty to draw that line clearly and unequivocally. My Lord.
18:57
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Portrait Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (Green Party)
-
-
I rise to move my amendment on >> I rise to move my amendment on taking out clause one, two, four. And I'm doing that because, well, And I'm doing that because, well, for two reasons. First of all, I think it is unnecessary, and it could be even more oppressive than could be even more oppressive than the law that that this Labour government has already passed. I mean, let me be clear. I support the right to worship, to access places of worship freely and safely, and I would actually come along to anywhere that where people are protesting and making life difficult for anybody who wants to worship.

I think that's unacceptable. But this clause is not a targeted protection against genuinely threatening behaviour. It's a broad, low threshold power that risks sweeping up lawful, peaceful protest on the basis of guesswork rather than evidence. Exactly. In the previous group, again, clause one, two, four allows conditions to be imposed where a protest may intimidate persons of reasonable firmness in the vicinity of a place of worship. And May is doing a lot of work here. So is vicinity. Neither is defined.

Together they create a power that's open to misuse. This is not about stopping harassment or threats. We already have laws for that. We have strong laws. If someone is genuinely intimidating worshippers, the police already have plenty of powers to intervene. So what does this clause actually add? The real problem is that this clause allows restrictions to be imposed, even where the protest is peaceful, so long as someone claims they might feel intimidated. That is not a hypothetical risk.

It almost any protest that touches on controversial issues could be said to intimidate somebody. Pride marches, trade union demos, climate protests, peaceful protests against war or injustice all could be caught by this wording if they happen to be near a place of worship. And in many places in our cities particularly, I would say in London, particularly central Westminster, where so many protests happen, then it's very difficult not to be near a place of worship, and that creates a very real danger of rolling exclusion zones, where protest is progressively pushed out of public space altogether, not because of evidence of harm, but because of location and perception.

The Joint Committee on Human Rights has already warned about powers like this, where restrictions follow from assertion rather than demonstrated necessity. And once again, the risk is that enforcement becomes inconsistent. It's subjective and influenced by the popularity or political content of the protest. Articles ten and 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights require necessity and proportionality. They also impose positive obligations on the state to enable peaceful protests to take place, not to hollow it out as this clause does.

We should protect people from real intimidation. Of course we should. We should not undermine the right to protest, though, by legislating on the basis of fear, speculation and guesswork. And I must say, the proscription of Palestine action seems to have been brought. It has been brought up today, and I would say it's looking slightly rushed compared with the government's reluctance to prescribe another potentially terrorist organisation. For example, the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps. And I would like to ask why this government keeps legislating on issues we don't need and not legislating on things we do need.

For example, some sort of control of facial recognition. That's something that you could usefully bring in. So I a question for the Minister how will the vicinity be interpreted in practice, especially in areas like central Westminster, where multiple places of worship actually sit quite closely together, which obviously creates a risk of a rolling exclusion zone? And what does clause one, two, four add that's not already achievable through existing public order powers and criminal offences, without lowering the threshold into speculation? I really think this government needs better advice on the legislation that they keep trying to bring through.

I say keep trying to bring through on. They are, of course, just pushing it through regardless and not listening. And I would say that this is another example of very bad law.
19:02
Lord Hain Portrait Lord Hain (Labour)
-
-
First of all, agree and endorse >> First of all, agree and endorse what the noble Lord Polak said about Bondi and the Manchester synagogue, because those terrible synagogue, because those terrible attacks were example modern examples of the persecution and pogroms that Jewish communities pogroms that Jewish communities have suffered for centuries. And he was right to to to remind us about that. My Lords, I wish to speak to the amendments to clause one, two, four, tabled by my noble friend Baroness Blower, to which I've added my name, and also, most importantly, my opposition to new clause.

The new clause table as amendment 372 by my noble friend, the Minister, who has been a long standing friend as a fellow Welsh MP for decades and also a valued member of my ministerial team when I was Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, my Lords, freedom of expression and the right to peaceful protest form the bedrock of any liberal democracy like our own. These rights are not a mere courtesy granted by the state. They're a fundamental part of British liberty, also enshrined by the European Convention on Human Rights and the Human Rights Act.

These freedoms are deeply woven into our history through iconic protest movements from the Tolpuddle Martyrs and Peterloo to the Chartists, the suffragettes and the anti-apartheid movement. Each of these causes, and I stress this, were disruptive indeed vilified at the time, but are now recognised as vital movements, successfully winning fundamental rights for millions of British citizens and others abroad. Yet that long tradition of assembly and free protest is now sadly under threat. Any proposal that hands the police unprecedented powers to restrict this right should give this House and every British citizen serious cause for alarm.

That is precisely why I find clause one, two, four of the Crime and Policing Bill so worrying. Firstly, it would allow protests to be banned and restricted in the so-called vicinity of places of religious worship. Yet this house is being asked to legislate without clarity. In my noble friend Baroness Blower has said vicinity is undefined and the term may intimidate. Is is equally vague. Such imprecision invites arbitrary interpretation and risks handing law enforcement sweeping discretionary powers to curtail lawful protest.

It may also put police officers in an impossible position. Doing their jobs. Secondly, let's be honest about the context here. This clause does not arise in a vacuum. It is clearly framed as a response to national demonstrations in support of Palestinian rights, demonstrations that have been repeatedly and wrongly labelled as hate marches. These protests have never targeted places of worship. They never would, and indeed, they never should. What's more, Jewish campaigners and organisations have been integral to many of these marches, and despite hundreds of thousands of people taking to the streets, arrests have routinely been fewer than at most football matches.

Indeed, the police themselves acknowledged that there has been no evidence of any threat to places of worship linked to these marches and across more than 33 national demonstrations. Not one has targeted or deliberately passed a synagogue. Of course, the appalling anti-Semitic attack on a synagogue in Manchester and the Islamophobic attack on a mosque in Peacehaven remind us why our Jewish citizens, and indeed all religious community, must be properly protected. But surely Ministers must agree that these terrible attacks were entirely unrelated to protest.

Crucially, the police already possess robust powers, extensive powers to safeguard places of worship in individuals under genuine threat. We must also ask, with these powers be applied to far right mobilisations outside asylum hotels, where vulnerable refugee communities are explicitly targeted and intimidated. Or is enforcement selective? Clause 124 risks introducing political censorship through the back door. The right to worship freely and the right to protest peacefully are not competing freedoms. Both must be upheld. This clause sets them against one another, and in doing so, I think weakens.

Both existing powers have already been used repressively against campaigners and at great public cost. Clause one, two, four would further entrench that approach in law. For these reasons, I support the amendments tabled by Baroness Jones and Baroness Blower, and I ask the government to think again. And if there is no such rethink, and if it comes to that, I will vote against clause one, two, four, my Lords. New clause. The new clause after clause one, two, four to the crime and policing.

The policing Bill, though presented as a response to public inconvenience, poses a serious danger to freedom of speech and peaceful protest. Expanding the definition of serious disruption by introducing the concept of so-called cumulative disruption, it imposes a sweeping duty on the police to restrict or prohibit protests based not on their conduct, but on their frequency or persistence in a particular area, restricting protests simply because it disrupts daily life undermines the very mechanism that gives protest its power. It's precisely cumulative disruption over many years that made early trade unionists, the suffragettes, the civil rights and anti-apartheid movements so effective.

No protest movement has ever brought about change through a single demonstration, but rather cumulative protests. To criminalise that principle is to hollow out that very right itself. My Lords, the new clause three characterises protest as an inconvenience to be managed rather than a democratic right to be protected. Its language is dangerously broad. It fails to define when disruption becomes cumulative. Over what time frame is it to be assessed, or how significant that disruption must be. Such elasticity gives the police sweeping powers to apply arbitrary and inconsistent enforcement, and creates a serious chilling effect on free expression.

It would also allow the police to relocate protests to areas of minimal visibility or impact, permitting demonstrations for politically favourable causes in prominent locations, while pushing unpopular dissent to the margins. My Lords, if this power had been statutorily, statutorily available from 1969, when I was leading protests at Twickenham Rugby Stadium and Lord's Cricket ground amongst many other sporting venues right across Britain against touring apartheid all white South African teams, surely they would have been blocked, thereby blocking the subsequent sports boycott almost universally imposed against whites only sports tours from apartheid South Africa, which Nelson Mandela, amongst others, judged to have been decisive in bringing about the downfall of apartheid.

My Lords, the term area is to be widely interpreted, with restrictions be imposed on entire towns or even the whole of central London. Non-Violent disruption is often the only way marginalised communities and civil rights protesters can make themselves heard by those who would otherwise ignore them. Neutral policing is a laudable objective, and I upheld that principle when I was Secretary of State for Northern Ireland. But this new clause makes policing politically oppressive. It's difficult to ignore the political context.

The amendment follows sustained marches in support of Palestinian rights and in opposition to the war in Gaza. I have already opposed the prescription of Palestine action as a terrorist group, and I am not going to rehash those arguments because that prescription equates it with the appalling terrorism of al Qaeda and Islamic State. For objecting to the shameful prescription, it is no surprise at all, to me at least, that hundreds of peaceful protesters, including disabled people, the elderly and the young, retired vicars and magistrates have been arrested as terrorists.

Now there are protesters in prison on bail on hunger strike. If they die, that will be an even more shameful stain on this government and this Parliament. My Lords, the new clause contained in government amendment 372 risks compounding those injustices rather than correcting them. It is oppressive and unjust. It won't just be marches for Palestinian rights that are affected. The impact will be much more wide ranging. The amendment is also open to abuse by future governments. Governments of the right, which could urge the police to stamp out political demonstrations.

My Lords, this House has been here before. In February 2023, your Lordships rejected a similar conservative amendment to the Public Order Act that sought to restrict process on the basis of cumulative disruption. In May 2023, the then home secretary, Suella Braverman, attempted to introduce the same concept by Statutory Instrument only for the High Court to rule it unlawful. A year later, this new clause contained in the Government Amendment 37 two is simply the latest chapter, I'm afraid, in a familiar and troubling pattern.

While I acknowledge that some protests can be upsetting or experienced by some as intimidating, sweeping restrictions on peaceful assembly are not the solution. Freedom of expression is not absolute, and the police already possess a huge range of extensive powers to deal with hate speech, incitement to violence and serious threats, as indeed they should. The new clause contained in Government Amendment 372 goes much further, allowing the state to pre-emptively silence thousands of people based on an ill defined and speculative concept of disruption that is disproportionate, dangerous and profoundly undemocratic.

Eroding protest rights weakens accountability between elections and risks fostering authoritarianism. One such powers exist. They rarely contract, they expand, often exponentially, and could well do so, especially under future governments, if they were less committed to the right of democratic dissent.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Can I just ask the Lord to bring his remarks to an end? He's well over ten minutes.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

over ten minutes. Mr. Benn, but invites misuse and undermines trust in both policing and Parliament. And that is why, in and Parliament. And that is why, in a joint statement, trade unions, charities, non-governmental organisations, faith, climate justice and human rights organisations have been vocal in their opposition. Only this week in their opposition. Only this week in rejecting it, I hope this your Lordships' House will honour our democratic heritage and safeguard those freedoms for future generations. I urge your Lordships to vote against this new clause contained in Government amendment 372.

If retabled at report.
19:14
Lord Bishop of Manchester Portrait The Lord Bishop of Manchester (Bishops)
-
-
My Lords, my Lords, I'm grateful for the opportunity to speak as this particular group amendments deeply affects places of worship and religious practice. It's always an honour to follow the noble Lord Hain, whose track record around Hain, whose track record around protests over so many years is one that I think we could we can all learn a great deal from. Noble Lords have referred to the attack in in Manchester on Yom Kippur that took place 15 minutes walk from my house.

I know that because I walked it the day after to meet with people there. The Rabbi, Daniel Walker, we share a surname and an initial that we don't think we're related is a good friend and has been a good yes, he's got more beer than me. You're quite. You're quite right, my Lord. He he he and I have been good friends for many years. An extraordinarily brave man. And I'm glad that we're able to to reflect on that here, here tonight. I do have some concerns with some of the amendments in this group.

I'm drawn mostly to to what Baroness Blower has spoken of earlier on. I think this is one of those occasions when I will accept a degree of precision. Milady, I think in the vicinity is a very vague term. I'm not sure that 50m gets it quite right. There are large chunks of Parliament Square are clearly within 50m of Saint Margaret's Church, Westminster. And and we wouldn't want to outlaw protest there. I think the heart of this clause for me should be the religious effect, should be about protests that are deliberately targeted at a particular religious community, either in its place of worship or, as a later group will determine, a school or community centre that that community uses.

We need to protect people who are accessing their their religious premises for proper religious purposes against those who are seeking to intimidate them. And again, I welcome the the notion about the intention to intimidate rather than simply it might have the effect of intimidating. That gives, I think, very helpful clarity there. But I am concerned that we don't draw this, draw this too widely here. I am concerned that the Jewish community in particular, who often attacked by anti-Semitic comments, they're able to attend their synagogues, attend their schools, attend their yeshivas without fear.

And I do want to pay tribute to the Community Safety Trust, who does such fantastic work in enabling the Jewish communities. I'm regularly all up and down my street. They are there in their hi vis uniforms so much of the time. It's a pity they're needed, but they do a fantastic job and they keep many of my Jewish neighbours safe at while they're practising their religion. I wonder whether we might go back and look through Hansard at a bill we dealt with here a few years ago.

We're looking at protests near abortion centres, abortion clinics where, after a rather difficult Committee stage debate, we had a rather a group of us got together from across the House and produced an amendment for Report stage, which actually won the House over quite, quite substantially. And I think that was looking at how, how much of a protest can be thus directed about a particular thing close to the site where it's taking place, when people are lawfully seeking to access, in those cases, a legitimate medical facility? And so I think perhaps it may help.

Before reports later, the Lords Minister has a look back through Hansard to see how we solve that particular tricky issue there, and see if that might be applied to this particular clause here on 3370 a, I think I just I do worry about the notion of holy war. I don't think we can we can put that into legislation. I might feel I'm taking part in a holy war against poverty or against homelessness. I might see in those terms what what does holy war mean? I think we know that we don't want to have people who are inciting violence, violent uprisings.

But again, I think the phrase holy war is perhaps not the right, the right terminology to come by there. I think, my Lords, that I'm I'm concerned a little bit about cumulative impact that if we I do see we can't have counter-demonstrations necessarily too close to each other, but but simply saying, well, this area has had enough demonstrations for a while and they need to move somewhere else. I'm not quite sure that that equally fine finds the mark, but I would advise as being a little bit more precise, as Baroness Blower has suggested, and particularly looking back at how we solved the issue around abortion clinics as perhaps a way of solving around protests close to religious centres.



**** Possible New Speaker ****

With Lord Polak in thanking my noble friend Lord Walney for all his hard work and indeed his leadership in seeking to secure a fairer balance in this context, unlike Lord Hain, I positively unlike Lord Hain, I positively welcome amendment 372, Government amendment 372, because it will amendment 372, because it will ensure that the police must take account of cumulative disruption when exercising their power to impose conditions on public processions and public assemblies. The amendment will be, and is particularly welcomed by synagogues and their members, whose access to and from Saturday prayers has been
19:19
Lord Pannick Portrait Lord Pannick (Crossbench)
-
-
regularly disrupted by hostile, abusive and intimidating crowds of abusive and intimidating crowds of protesters. That's the effect whether or not it's the intention whether or not it's the intention of the protesters and the Bishop of Manchester suggested we should look at intention here. It is the effect and it's very damaging to the right and it's very damaging to the right and it is a right of of worship. Lord Hain, with great respect should recognise that there are competing rights here.

There's not just the right to protest, there's the right to go to a synagogue, to be able to have access to a synagogue, to be able to leave a synagogue, and not to be deterred by hundreds of abusive protesters who are protesting in favour of a particular cause. Lord Hain made the point that cumulative protests may be very effective, and I'm sure he's right about that in many contexts. But the point of government amendment 372 is not to stop protests.

It's not to stop people expressing their view about matters of public policy. The question is where. And the question is why is it necessary every Saturday to go past the same synagogue with hundreds of people preventing those who wish to exercise their right of religious observance to do that peacefully and securely, and to get there and to leave? So, yes, protest. But you don't have to do it in the same place, along the same street each and every week.

The street has no significance for the protester, but it has a real significance for those who want to go to the synagogue, Lord Hain says. And he's right that the right to protest is not in conflict with the right to religious observance. The problem arises as here, where the protesters each week go along the same road, and as I say, they don't have to go along that road. They can protest somewhere else. And that's what this amendment is concerned to achieve.

The amendment reintroduces with an improvement the secondary legislation, which was introduced by the last government, which was held unlawful by the Court of Appeal in a case brought by liberty, and it was held unlawful, contrary to what Lord Hain suggested, the secondary legislation was held unlawful by reason of matters other than cumulative disruption. Court of appeal did not say that the cumulative disruption provisions in the Statutory Instrument were unlawful. What the Court of Appeal said was that other parts of the Statutory Instrument, which sought to define the circumstances in which protest was unacceptable, were unlawful, but not on cumulative disruption.

Amendment 372 is an improvement on what the last government introduced, because it imposes a duty on the police to have regard to cumulative disruption. The Statutory Instrument introduced by the last government merely conferred a discretion. Can I also mention amendments three, seven, 3 to 3, seven, eight from the opposition front bench? And I'm grateful to them for producing those amendments. They would vary the criteria in government. Amendment 372, because they would focus attention for the purposes of cumulative disruption, not on the geographical area in which the public procession or assembly is repeatedly held, but on whether the repeated procession or assembly concerns quote the same subject matter, unquote, recognise.

Of course, these amendments are well motivated, but I would not myself support them. The vice of cumulative disruption is that it occurs repeatedly in the same geographical area, in the same street near the synagogue, for example, and causing disruption every Saturday to focus on whether the repeated protests concern the same subject matter. Misses the point, in my view, and I'm also concerned that to legislate by reference to the same subject matter will inevitably provoke disputes as to how the police should apply such a criterion.

Protesters would inevitably say that last week's march was in support of Gaza. This week's is against the Netanyahu government, and next week's is against the policy of the Trump administration. I'm very doubtful that a specific reference to 50m, as proposed by Baroness Blower and Lord Hain, would suffice. It all depends, doesn't it, on the size of the protest and the nature of the premises. And I think this is a context where police discretion is desirable.

Finally, I've added my name to amendment 380, tabled by my noble friend Lord Lord Walney. That would apply the duty to take account of cumulative disruption to the power to prohibit public processions. And I think that the same reasoning which justifies the government's wish to require cumulative disruption to be considered in relation to the power to impose conditions, also justifies a duty to take account of cumulative cumulative disruption in relation to the power to ban a public procession.
19:26
19:27
Lord Mendelsohn Portrait Lord Mendelsohn (Labour)
-
-
My Lords. >> My Lords. >> My Lord, I rise to to propose

**** Possible New Speaker ****

My Lord, I rise to to propose and to put my name to amendment 378, which is stands in my name, as well which is stands in my name, as well as 486, which is done together with Baroness Deech. And of course, 378 has already been spoken to by the noble Lord Lord Polak, and it was also in the name of the noble Lord Lord Austin just to give the. I just want to start off by thanking the government for introducing this clause and for their amendment.

I think both are very important measures and I'm grateful for them for for doing it. And I hope they remain as strong and resolute and pushing them through as they can be. The reason why we're here. And I'll just try and give us context into what we're doing, is that we are facing a very considerable problem about non prosecutions, about the type of thing that's happening in our society which is undermining democratic resilience, which is undermining social cohesion, and which is particularly targeting targeting the Jewish community.

And that is the area where I think where my amendments are particularly relevant, which apply in that. In that context, it is absolutely clear that one of the issues that is coming up is that there are a lot of existing powers and they aren't used. In fact, I did in fact, note that for fear of mentioning policy exchange again. But Jonathan Hall KC, the reviewer of terrorism, made a very significant point in his speech there today where he said that, you know, my perception is if you don't deal with anti-Israel hatred, you leave wiggle room for those who indulge in anti-Semitism but formally disavow it.

Once hatred to Israelis is tolerated, then it is carried around like a flame. He made the further point, which I think is immensely significant. The truth is that hatred of nationality fits into the hatred of race like a glove. And importantly, our law recognises this. The Public order. The Public Order Act 1986, prohibits stirring up racial hatred. And let me, let me refer to section 17 of the 1986 act, which defines racial hatred. And I'm going to do it slowly, he said.

In this part, racial hatred means hatred against a group of persons defined by reference to colour, race, nationality, including citizenship or ethnic and national origins. In fact, what that's very clear is to say the number of things that should have already been prosecuted, not least actually the actions against the restaurant which which was raised earlier. The reason why I raised this and put this in the context of why we put this amendment in, is that there is a very considerable problem about enforcement here, and the reason why we put an amendment in to be very clear about what we should be enforcing against is because the law is not being applied.

In fact, what this refers to is something which two police chief constables, the commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, the Chief Constable of Manchester, have had to make an act of political courage to say they're going to enforce the law. How shameful is that? That something that should have been dealt with ends up being an act of courageousness by a couple of senior police officers alone? And herein is the problem, is that actually, in the end, we aren't sending the right signals about what it is, and that is where the job of Parliament exists.

So the reason to put this in is to be clear that it is a political priority to do it. I'm sure that many of the reviews that we will have will say, the problem is we're not enforcing the law. And the point is now a large part of what we're having to do within the context of this bill is to define it further in order to do that. And that comes through amendment 46, which is it is not just a problem about the police, and it is not just a problem about we're not being clear enough on political signals.

I wish we'd been a much clearer earlier on the signal about whether or not it was appropriate to make the sorts of protests outside a restaurant that were said. There are clearly concerns and considerations about whether or not the CPS is being too cautious in doing this and not being able to to do its job. So we have an amendment suggesting that we set up a particular unit inside the CPS, which is there to specialise in this. I'm not sure it's an entirely good idea.

I can speak quite comfortably against it myself. Such units tend to actually end up being an act of caution against taking any action, but I think I just want to highlight and probe the issue around whether or not we've actually got this right, and we've sent the right signals from this House and from Parliament as to what we're actually trying to intend to do. And may I just say that whilst I associate myself with some of the other amendments that have been proposed here, there are some which I find deeply disturbing and deeply concerning.

I cannot overstate my opposition, and I do hope the government take absolutely no account of the amendments by my noble friend Baroness Blower. I do find this deeply troubling, that the notion that where we are trying to define, of course, there is a right to protest, there is a right to in a free and democratic society. But that has to be balanced with the intention, if it is to restrict the rights of others in that society. And what we are facing are not the litany of things that many have been saying are the great acts.

These are absolutely terrible incidents where the police do not have the powers to do so. I find it absolutely reprehensible, the idea that we're going to have definitions about what is or isn't acceptable, or even distances. I do not believe that any one of those people proposing these motions has, or if they have, I am deeply, even more deeply concerned actually been to any of these, to see the type of thing that takes place, the abuse, the phone in the face, the absolute frenzy of hatred, the attempt to restrict movement, all the things that take place not just against the people who are going to be activity, but to the caretakers, to the cleaners, to any part of the staff or any part of the other people.

I am deeply ashamed that even on my side, people who associate themselves with the rights of workers to even be able to work inside communities which are trying to express themselves, can be intimidated by by people. I think that giving this discretion to the police, who have had to experience this for a long period of time is a very proportionate measure, and I hope the government keep firm in rejecting the accountants been given by others as to why this needs any change.
19:34
Baroness Chakrabarti Portrait Baroness Chakrabarti (Labour)
-
-
And so the Committee is in the business of precision and proportionality. And I think these proportionality. And I think these two concepts have rightly been been raised by a number of noble Lords raised by a number of noble Lords and my noble friends, and it's because of reasons of proportionality and precision that I agree that the concept of the vicinity is too vague and too broad. I say that whilst completely acknowledging that places of worship are sensitive places and it is completely proportionate within the Convention on Human Rights to give them some extra protection.

There is precedent for concepts of area and vicinity being too flabby and too broad, and the precedent was my Lord. Section 44 of the Terrorism Act 2000. Noble Lords may remember this allowed an area not defined to be designated for the purpose of suspicionless stop and search. This was the 2000 act, and in 2003, in response to demonstrations at the Excel Centre in the Docklands, anti Anti-arms demonstrations, a number of protestors were stopped and searched and issued notices, and only through the parliamentary debates and the litigation that followed, did the public become aware that all of England and Wales had been designated during the Iraq War.

So that was the breadth of area for Suspicionless stop and search, and it was a stop and search power that was used as an anti-protest power. That doesn't mean that there can't be limitations, but they need some definition. And I think that is the concern. And by the way, after many years of litigation in the Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, the UK government was found wanting because of the breadth and the blanket nature of the power, because there was no definition. So I think I'm trying to help my noble friends in government by suggesting that concepts like areas and vicinities will be better for for definition.

And so I support my noble friend Baroness Blower commend her remarks in in moving her amendment and and commend my noble friend Lord Hain. And I will remind the committee that he just an anti-apartheid activist in his digging up sports field and

**** Possible New Speaker ****

fields and so on, digging up whatever he was digging up. I was sitting on him.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

I was sitting on him. He was sitting on them. Not I don't mean to defame him, but he did go on, of course, to be did go on, of course, to be Northern Ireland Secretary and therefore has some understanding of the need to balance rights. That's the need to balance rights. That's the rights of peaceful dissent, but also the rights of people to go about their business, particularly about their business, particularly in the homes and places of worship and so on.

Proportionality and precision, my Lords, now this, this, this vice of vagueness with the concept of vicinity is mirrored in the concept of area for the purposes of cumulative disruption, as with the section 44 provision that ended up being impugned in the Strasbourg court area for the purposes of cumulative disruption is not defined. And so we're looking at a very, very broad power here. And I say to noble Lords, with all solidarity and their concerns about, for example, synagogues and places of faith and worship, that provisions like these can be applied as much to a counter-protest as to a protest to one group or another group at different times.

And when we are legislating, we need to have a mind to how these powers might be used in the future. To those noble Lords who spoke of a sort of new quasi terrorist prescription, but for for groups that don't quite meet the threshold, not terrorism, counter counter extremism, extreme protest, etcetera, etcetera, not meeting by definition, not meeting the tests of terrorism, but something less than that. I urge extreme, extreme caution. There is a reason why powers to prescribe have been limited to date, to terrorist groups, to that exceptional threat.

And the reason is that guilt by association is extremely dangerous when you are dealing with broad communities, millions of people potentially, and protest movements. I have no doubt, my Lords, that some suffragettes and we say to them now, don't we everyone in this committee saints, the canonises, the suffragettes, some of those activities by some of those suffragettes would would meet the terrorist threshold. But does that mean that we want to to tell them all in the same way and suggest that the entire movement should be subject to some kind of prescription? I urge caution with that.

And with any amendments in this group that go further than is

**** Possible New Speaker ****

precise or proportionate. Sir. I rise to Lord.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

I rise to Lord. I was just going to say that that the debate on this amendment that the debate on this amendment 370 be adjourned so that we can now

**** Possible New Speaker ****

move on to dinner break business. The question is. The debate on amendment 370 A be

**** Possible New Speaker ****

The debate on amendment 370 A be now adjourned. As many as of that opinion will say content the contrary not content. The contents have it.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Lord Dholakia to move that this be resumed. We will then move to dinner break business. We will therefore not return to the bill until 2039.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

until 2039. Question for short debate Official Development Assistance Official Development Assistance
19:40
19:41
Lord Bates Portrait Lord Bates (Conservative)
-
-
five times the size of England. People would travel long distances to access its life saving care. The to access its life saving care. The hospital was funded by British taxpayers and delivered in partnership with Unicef and Gavi. partnership with Unicef and Gavi. Just as we were leaving, a tall elderly man was running in carrying elderly man was running in carrying a small child desperately seeking assistance. The child was a girl. assistance. The child was a girl. Around five was his granddaughter.

He had walked three days to get it to the hospital. Later, the nurses told us that she died on the way from dehydration caused by diarrhoea, a virus that still kills around 500,000 under-fives every year. The staff pointed out that a simple sash of oral rehydration therapy, essentially sugar and salt mixed with clean water, a treatment costing around £0.50, could have saved her life. I will never forget the look of grief and the vacant stare he gave as he sat on the steps of that hospital on hearing the news.

He had done everything he could for his granddaughter, but I felt the same could not be said for us. I told him this. We could have done more, but now we are proposing to do even less. There is a dangerous myth that has emerged in recent years that the UK aid is wasted. Tell that to the parents sitting at the bedside of their sick children in the wards of the Al-Sabah hospital. The second fallacy is that national security depends solely on defence, whereas in fact it is a careful blend of diplomacy, development and defence.

And the more effective we are in deploying the first two, the less we need to rely on the third. In a debate on the 13th of July 2021 on the decision to cut the aid budget from 0.7% to 0.5%, the then shadow Chancellor, Rachel Reeves, said in column 220 of the official report. If this goes through this evening and the House votes for it this evening, it will diminish Britain. It will reduce our power and influence for good in the world, and it will undermine our security.

She was right. The final dangerous fallacy is that the British people do not support aid. I don't accept it. The British people, I believe, are the most generous and compassionate in the world. That is why many of the leading humanitarian charities were started here Oxfam, Save the Children, Christian Aid, Islamic Relief, WaterAid and of course, Live Aid. What angers the British people is seeing their generous aid not reaching the people for whom it was intended, a case in point of figures released by the Foreign Office, which have shown that over the past year the proportion of the budget allocated to health has been cut by 46% to 527 million, whereas the budget for energy, climate change and the environment has been increased by 59% to 658 million.

It's a bewildering decision which puts lives at risk. It's like the NHS being asked to make savings in its budget and choosing first to close accident and emergency units and intensive care wards to put more solar panels on the roof. Can the Minister confirm these numbers, and can she tell us how this decision was made? When she comes to respond, let me give just three examples of the real world effect of these changes in priority. Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance has saved an estimated 13 million lives.

The UK government has announced its contribution will be cut by 24%. The Global Fund to Fight Aids, TB and malaria, which has saved an estimated 65 million lives. The UK has announced its contribution is being cut by 15%. The World Food Programme providing emergency food assistance to 124 million people, cut by a third. The chair of the International Development Committee, Sarah Champion, said the savage cuts aid cuts announced this year are already proving to be a tragic error that will cost lives and livelihoods, undermine our international standing and ultimately threaten our national security.

They must be reversed. These decisions are already costing lives. The government's own equality impact assessment on a proposed ODA cuts have confirmed this. The Gates Foundation has estimated that preventable childhood deaths last year increased for the first time this century by 200,000, from 4.6 million to 4.8 million. The one campaign suggested that the UK cuts to the Gavi budget alone will cost 600,000 lives, but the cumulative effect of UK aid cuts as planned is likely to be measured in millions of lives, mostly children.

To put that in context, the UN estimates that the total civilian deaths in Ukraine, Israel and Gaza over the past four years tragically number some 85,000. And yet, by comparison, these millions of deaths passes by largely unnoticed. It doesn't need to be this way. The Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs at the UN, the distinguished former British diplomat Tom Fletcher, has launched an emergency appeal. The Global Humanitarian Overview, based on his humanitarian reset. The aim is to save the lives of 87 million people.

It is laser focussed on the most urgent, life saving humanitarian needs. Exactly what British taxpayers have always supported. He is looking to raise $23 billion from the international community by March this year. The plan is so convincing and the need so great that even the Trump administration have pledged to back it with $2 billion. The UK has yet to respond. I'm delighted to say that Tom Fletcher will be here tomorrow giving a briefing on his plans in committee room one at four three 4:30 p.m.

and it's open to all parliamentarians to learn more about this compelling proposal. But the more I look into the details of this matter, the more that I see it is less a crisis of cash and more a crisis of misplaced priorities. I firmly believe that by changing priorities and being laser focussed on saving lives, we could find $1 billion from within the existing older budget to support this ambitious plan to save lives, restore our international reputation and enhance our national security in the process.

I commend this plan to the Minister and

**** Possible New Speaker ****

indeed to the whole House. My Lords, Lord Campbell-Savours is taking part remotely. I invite Lord Campbell-Savours to speak.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

My Lords, the unpalatable truth is the 25% cut in OECD support, is the 25% cut in OECD support, together with the cutting European aid is proving catastrophic for development and humanitarian
19:48
19:50
Lord Oates Portrait Lord Oates (Liberal Democrat)
-
-
I thank the noble Lord Lord Bates for initiating this debate, and I declare my interest as CEO of and I declare my interest as CEO of United Against Malnutrition and Hunger. As we've heard, the world faces an unprecedented series of humanitarian crises driven by conflict and climate shocks from conflict and climate shocks from DRC to Myanmar, Palestine to Sudan, Somalia to Yemen, and many places in between. In the face of this staggering human suffering, rather than step up to the plate, the world has chosen to step away, allowing conflict to go unresolved and leading to huge shortfalls in funding required to provide desperately needed food, medical supplies and access to clean water.

In Sudan, for example, the World Food Programme has a funding shortfall of $662 million. Hospitals are out of critical supplies of basic medicines and emergency therapeutic foods. Last year, speaking to the BBC, doctor Ibrahim Abdullah Keita, a paediatrician at Al Saudi Hospital in Al-fashir, told the BBC we have many malnourished children admitted in hospital but unfortunately there is no single sachet of therapeutic food. The situation, it is so miserable, it is so catastrophic. In DRC, UNICEF's level three emergency response continues to face severe funding shortfalls, with a 73% gap in health funding and a 42% gap in nutrition funding.

Agencies are having to make decisions that, in effect, take from the hungry in order to provide for the starving. This story is repeated in Yemen, Afghanistan, South Sudan and many, many other places, and the UN s ability is constrained by our own ODA cuts. So I urge the government to do all they can to maximise the use of the funds that we have through innovative mechanisms such as the Child Nutrition Fund and other financing mechanisms.
19:52
Baroness Gohir Portrait Baroness Gohir (Crossbench)
-
-
Yeah. >> My Lords, the UK government has chosen to withdraw vital safety net from the world's most vulnerable from the world's most vulnerable people at a time of unprecedented global instability. There are currently around 59 active conflicts worldwide, the highest since the Second World War. Yet the response has been to cut aid. The government's own assessment show that women and girls are bearing the brunt. These costs are costing lives, these cuts are costing lives and these deaths are preventable.

Reducing funding for maternity care is leading to more women dying in childbirth and pregnancy. The closure of women's refuges is leaving women exposed to gender based violence. Fewer girls are attending school, increasing risks of child marriage, FGM and sexual exploitation. When girls and women lose access to education and livelihoods, whole societies become less stable. Is the noble Lady the Minister able to therefore share which countries have been most impacted by the aid cuts? My Lords, I understand that the government needed more funding for defence, but why not take this money from elsewhere? Why take it from life saving support for women and girls? Does she accept that this has damaged the UK's global reputation? And how can the government credibly champion women and girls abroad, particularly through an appointment of women and girls envoy at the very same time that it made the cuts, cuts of funding to women and girls.

If the government is worried about public opinion, it could provide more information on how the funds are spent and the impact of those funds. My Lords, the government is capable of U-turns and I hope it does another one and restore aid. And I hope it does that before more more before preventable harm is done further. We on this bench continue to lament the reduction in Oda, and I do want to call on the government, as others had to publish a clear roadmap for returning to previous commitments on international development, which affects so many people.

And as has already been
19:54
19:55
Lord Herbert of South Downs Portrait Lord Herbert of South Downs (Conservative)
-
-
My Lords, in the two minutes which I have allotted to speak, another four people will die another four people will die globally from the disease of tuberculosis. That's a million and a quarter people a year. It's the a quarter people a year. It's the world's deadliest disease and quite unnecessarily still exacts this terrible toll. For 20 years, I have been campaigning to draw attention to the problem of TB and our continuing failure to beat the disease. The last ten, as chair of the global TB caucus.

And it would be easy to be despondent because of the fiscal headwinds of which we have heard much already, the reductions in overseas development spending, not just by this government but by others, notably the United States. And yet I find myself being more optimistic now than I have been for some time, that we could beat this disease. Finally, because of the advent of innovative new treatments, new technology, at last, the prospect of a vaccine which does not exist for adults in sight.

And so I would simply implore the government to recognise that it still does have the power to help end this disease, in spite of the reductions in funding, which are simply a fact at the moment, it has the ability to convene both at the ministerial level and at the level of its missions. It could say something about this issue on world TB day. It could say more about how the vaccine, when it becomes available, could be rolled out.

It could continue to support cost effective programs like TB reach, that find innovative new solutions to beat this disease. We cannot just fall prey to counsels of despair. There is much that the government can still do, and I would be grateful for the opportunity to write to the Minister about that. And perhaps if she'd be willing to meet me to discuss those ideas.
19:57
Lord Evans of Weardale Portrait Lord Evans of Weardale (Crossbench)
-
-
My Lords, I congratulate the noble Lord Lord Bates on securing this debate, and I declare an this debate, and I declare an interest as the chairman of the Halo Trust, the global mine and explosives removal charity. I recognise that the pressing nature of the security threats that we face today may mean that other spending needs to be curtailed, but if this is to include Oda, then the cuts need to be made strategically and in a way that retains a distinctive UK contribution.

Humanitarian mine action is just such a UK contribution. It is a strategic asset for this country, one that saves lives, helps stabilise fragile regions and contributes to the UK's bilateral relations with a number of vital states. In 2023, 69% of civilian personnel mine clearance globally was carried out either by the Halo Trust or the Mines Advisory Group. Both are British charities. This is an area where we do not merely contribute, but we lead, drawing on decades of experience and credibility that no other country can match, and operating in many of the most troubled parts of the world.

Places that are matter to the United Kingdom, such as Ukraine, Afghanistan, Syria, Zimbabwe and Gaza. I therefore ask the noble Lord, the Minister, whether the government will maintain its commitment to the Global Mine Action Programme, which is a great British success story. And I also ask whether the government recognises that the Integrated Security Fund should increase its focus on preventing conflict, which in the longer term is more effective than responding to crises as they arise. If the ISF is genuinely to be integrated, then it must be used upstream to prevent conflict, not simply to respond.

Once instability reaches our shores.
19:59
Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Portrait Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (Green Party)
-
-
I thank Lord Bates for securing >> I thank Lord Bates for securing this debate. My brief report remarks draw on two reports from the Public Accounts Committee from June, highlighting the links between trade deals, aid cuts and superbugs, and a Chatham House superbugs, and a Chatham House report from November titled rethinking UK Aid Policy in the ERA of Global Funding Cuts. But first, a note of perspective. This year, global aid is expected to have declined by almost a third versus the level of 2023.

This while the level of subsidy from the Global South to the wealthy continues to grow. Huge repayment on high interest loans to wealthy banks, institutions and governments. The physical extractivism also continuing apace, with natural resources ripped from global South lands, pollution and destruction left as payment. The poor particularly play with their health, and the globe sees fast rising threats from infectious diseases. For as we learnt from Covid, no one is safe until everyone is safe. Health provision is in a state of crisis.

The FCDO figures, already referred to 45% fall in 20 2425 on health funding, another 46% coming this year. A w.h.o analysis last year found country offices reporting massive disruption in the 20th century. There was a hubristic complacency that humans had essentially defeated infectious diseases. That's clearly not the case now. But still the cuts. And we are allowing even encouraging the disease organisms to marshal and develop their forces against us by developing and spreading resistance to the drugs we have so extensively developed and put out to try to treat people through antimicrobial resistance.

As both the reports I draw on indicate. Now. The closure of the Fleming Fund was announced in July. The government says it plans to mitigate this with a new partnership model, as the Chatham House report says, there are still no details of this. Could the Minister tell me here or write to me about what the plans are for that partnership model?
20:02
Lord McConnell of Glenscorrodale Portrait Lord McConnell of Glenscorrodale (Labour)
-
-
My Lords, I draw attention to my >> My Lords, I draw attention to my Lords register and interests Register there. I noticed tonight on the news there is a suggestion on the news there is a suggestion that the the government might be about to announce a so-called about to announce a so-called another so-called U-turn, and that would be the 13th for those that appear to be counting in the media, I think 13 is a very unlucky number. If I could say to the Minister and and to the government, and perhaps they might want to consider a 14th before the 12 months is out.

Since the election, since the announcement last year of the cut in ODA, I really do believe that the Prime Minister and the Chancellor should think again about becoming the first Labour government in history to spend less than conservatives on overseas development assistance, and I hope that between now and the one year anniversary of the announcement last year, they will rethink this. Otherwise, from April this year, people will be thrown out of school, they will lose vaccinations, they will lose job opportunities, and they will lose access to clean water.

And that would be a humanitarian disaster, as described very eloquently by my friend, the noble Lord Lord Bates, who's got a terrific voluntary record in this sphere, as well as a fantastic record as a Minister. However, I disagree with him on one point, and that is that all of this budget or a substantial proportion of this budget should be so directly allocated to the consequences of conflict or the consequences of the displacement that we see around the world. I do believe that in the new reduced budget, there is a desperate need for a specific allocation to conflict prevention and preventative work of the sort described by the noble Lord, Lord Evans, before me this evening.

And I hope that the government, in allocating this reduced budget, if it is not changed before the end of this financial year, allocates a specific resource to expertise to interventionist projects that help prevent conflict, and directly to the stability that is required to ensure that people have a chance to experience education, the health services, the job opportunities, and the other services that are so vital in their lives.
20:04
Baroness Sugg Portrait Baroness Sugg (Conservative)
-
-
My Lords, I will speak in relation to. relation to. >> Family planning and sexual and reproductive health, which are core components of effective components of effective humanitarian aid, not add ons. SRH services are at high risk of being disrupted during conflict and displacement, with a lack of access displacement, with a lack of access to essential sexual and reproductive health services, a leading cause of death for displaced women and girls. In 2024, the United Kingdom's funding for family planning is estimated to enable 11 million women to access modern contraception in a single year.

It prevented an estimated 3.7 million unintended pregnancies, including 1.2 million unsafe abortions and 1.3 million unplanned births. And, it's estimated, crucially, to averted almost 4000 maternal deaths in low and middle income countries. And these are not abstract statistics. They represent women who survived childbirth, girls who stayed in school and families able to plan their futures. Yet this progress is under serious threat as global funding cuts converge with multiple crises and conflicts. Whilst we await the final UK decisions on future spending, modelling from the Guttmacher Institute show that a 30% reduction in UK family planning funding alone would mean 3.3 million fewer people, reached more than 1 million additional unintended pregnancies, and an estimated 1170 additional maternal deaths.

This is also a question for value for money. Every pound invested in family planning yields almost £27 in social and economic benefits. Voluntary right based, rights based family planning underpins social stability, gender equality and economic growth and contributes to long term resilience. I recognise the importance of sustainability of country ownership and indeed partnership, and we can use modern financing tools and delivery models as well through debt relief, private sector innovation and smarter accountable financing that delivers lasting results. Unfpa's work through the Supplies Partnership has helped governments increase domestic contraceptive spending fivefold since 2020.

But transition must be predictable. Sudden funding withdrawals risk reversing hard won gains. I've heard the noble Lady, the Minister talk about gender mainstreaming, but I think there is a clear case for specific programming to and I urge the government to protect spending on sexual and reproductive health and rights within Oda. That's not only the right thing to do, it's one of the smartest investments we can make and is part of the solution to nearly every major global challenge that we face.
20:06
Baroness D'Souza Portrait Baroness D'Souza (Crossbench)
-
-
Worldwide cuts to international development programmes are a reality. We can't escape the reality. We can't escape the adverse effects this will have on poverty reduction, health care, education and importantly, on national security. Depressing as these statistics are, it enforces these statistics are, it enforces innovative, perhaps leaner ways of developing of delivering development assistance and priorities must include a greater reliance on locally led development and local civil organisations. My Lords, in its simplest form, development is a process of identifying viable local projects, establishing leadership which has the confidence of the community and supplying money and expertise where requested.

The final stage is to step away and begin again elsewhere. In short, supporting what people need are committed to and helping the local community to get on with it. In nearly all societies, small scale or otherwise, people make intelligent decisions about the welfare of their communities. Of course, there are exceptions and the job of the donor is to facilitate this. My Lords, having spent much of my working life in remote and impoverished communities and observing the international development fraternity at work.

Money is often wasted. Many projects fall in the short and medium terms, and too little planning is based on evidence. In 2001, in Afghanistan, I met a potential leader who had the intelligence, sensitivity and determination to achieve his dream of educating girls. All he lacked was funding. We began providing small amounts of few hundred pounds delivered here and there in brown paper envelopes. With this, he repaired buildings, created warm spaces and winter for people to congregate, worked with parents to persuade them of the value of educating their daughters, held classes on how to vote in the forthcoming election.

A few more hundred pounds for the construction of school buildings and increasing commitment from local families and business to support this programme, in which they had enormous pride. Teacher training and vocational courses were added. Female students began to attend universities in surrounding countries India, Bangladesh and in Australia, Canada and the UK. My Lord Saatchi I come to the end of my time, so I'm going to cut to the chase. The total contribution from the donors here in the UK over a period of some 20 years was in the region of £140,000, including fees for consultant engineers and auditing help.

In 2022, the Taliban returned. We continue to follow a pared down development model in Afghanistan, albeit in different guises. My Lords, development requires humility, evidence, trust and understanding of local cultural norms, as well as modest funds.
20:09
Baroness Goudie Portrait Baroness Goudie (Labour)
-
-
Mine was overseas development >> Mine was overseas development assistance is often discussed in terms of percentages, ceilings and terms of percentages, ceilings and factual headroom, but on the ground it looks very different. It looks like a clinic that is no longer like a clinic that is no longer open three days a week, a nutrition program that quietly stops enrolling new children, or a woman's safe place that closes because funding has ended since the reduction of UK aid from 0.7 to 0.5% of GNI, the cumulative effect of cuts has been profound.

The independent Commission for aid, My Lords impact, has documented programmes being scaled back or closed altogether, often with little notice, to implementing partners or affected communities. These decisions are not neutral. They have humanitarian consequences. My Lords, we are living through a moment of unprecedented global need. The United Nations estimates that more than 300 million people now require humanitarian assistance worldwide, the highest number ever recorded, driven by conflict and climate disasters and economic shocks. Over half of them are women and children.

At the same time, humanitarian responses plans chronically underfunded, often receiving less than 40% of what is required. My Lords, I'm just going to as we have little time. I just would like to say that, my Lords, that aid is not a charity. It is an investment, a stability, dignity and shared security. When we reduce it without care, we do not eliminate need. We deepen it. I hope the government will reflect carefully on the humanitarian impacts of both actual and planned reductions of Oda.

The place, the place and protection for the most vulnerable back in the centre of our approach, and in particular, as my colleague Lord McConnell has said, that during this dreadful period, we need to be implementing more money for sexual violence and conflict. We should be working to help communities to build peace and to build peace. We have to have women on the ground with children, and also women have to be at the peace table. And this should be very much part of our aid, and we should not be cutting aid at this difficult time.

Sorry.
20:11
Lord Londesborough Portrait Lord Londesborough (Crossbench)
-
-
Governments can be forced. >> Top down decisions without having the time to undertake scientific ground up assessments on the impact of those decisions. And the impact of those decisions. And that's very much the case with our Oda budget, which at a stroke will lose an annual £6.2 billion, taking it down to 9.2 billion. And in the space of five years, we have dropped from 0.7% of GNI, which in today's terms would in fact be 19.5 billion to less than 0.3%.

Once you factor in the cost of funds devoted to asylum support in the UK. There's no time to debate the rights and wrongs of these cuts. I will focus on measuring the humanitarian impact. And in that vein, I have some questions for the noble Lord, the noble Lady, the Minister one. When will a full impact assessment on UK Oda cuts be completed and shared with Parliament and the public, and how transparent and granular will that assessment be? Two specifically, will it cover the number of people impacted by age, gender and by country in the following five areas healthcare, education, nutrition, Housing and sanitation, and poverty.

And three what will be the projected mortality consequences of current planned defunding, i.e. the number of additional preventable deaths? These are hard, uncomfortable questions that deserve explicit answers, and I finish by providing some context courtesy of the Institute for Global Health, which estimates that the global decline in Oda funding could result in 22 million additional deaths by 2030, including 5 million children under the age of five.
20:13
Lord Bruce of Bennachie Portrait Lord Bruce of Bennachie (Liberal Democrat)
-
-
I congratulate Lord Bates both on the debate, his powerful speech on the debate, his powerful speech and say how much I enjoyed working with him as he development Minister, as co-chair of the APPG on Aid match, I would urge the government to make more use of it. The Minister has complained about loss Minister has complained about loss of public support for aid, but aid match can draw people in. It can and should be more than a gimmick. Experience has shown when people can see how their donations can change lives, it encourages giving.

It may also help people appreciate the difference between urgent emergency and long term commitment to building health systems. Educating young people, especially women and girls, and training for secure livelihoods. Will the Minister explain how the government is going to balance multilateral spending versus bilateral commitments? And she also explained how the government is going to divide the development, humanitarian assistance and development assistance. Long term partnerships I'm talking about with governments in developing countries can help build capacity and resilience.

We should not underestimate the goodwill that flows from such programmes. So will the government consider working with such governments to help build their own capacity and delivery? This requires relatively small amounts of funds in technical assistance and diplomatic support. No substitute for the aid cuts, but at least positive progress. So how does she propose to propose to work with the private sector to expand? Firstly, UK trade and investment, but also to encourage businesses to provide philanthropic support, to build capacity and strengthen bilateral partnerships.

The full impact of the aid cuts has yet to be felt, but the demise of USAID has already had consequences. So my final point is to ask what the UK government is doing to build partnerships to help aid and development funding, maximise achievement by cooperation and efficiency savings through pooling teams and resources nationally and internationally. The UK were world leaders in the field. I urge the government to show how we can be again.
20:16
Earl of Courtown Portrait The Earl of Courtown (Conservative)
-
-
My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend Lord Bates on securing this important debate. He has once again made a powerful and deeply personal case for the positive impact of UK overseas development impact of UK overseas development assistance and for the leadership role this country can and should play internationally. His account of what he has witnessed was moving, and it underlined the reality that behind every statistic, our human lives in an increasingly unstable world. The case for effective well-targeted development assistance is stronger than ever.

Britain must continue to work with international partners to secure the most vulnerable, to prevent crises escalating further and to promote stability where we can. The situation in Sudan, which this House has debated before, is a tragic example. The humanitarian catastrophe, catastrophe, catastrophe unfolding, the these demands demands urgent international action. Can the noble Baroness Minister please update the House on what assessment His Majesty's Government have made of the humanitarian, humanitarian impacts of recent and planned reductions in Oda, particularly in conflict affected areas? Can the noble Baroness also provide an update on what the UK government are doing to ensure that aid is reaching those who need it most, including efforts to alleviate famine, prevent the spread of disease and protect displaced populations.

As my noble friend rightly said, Britain is a generous and outward looking nation. The extraordinary support given by the public to international charities reflects a strong moral commitment to helping those in desperate circumstances. However, public confidence depends on knowing that aid is being used for its intended humanitarian purpose and is delivering real impact on the ground. In that context, can the noble Baroness update us on how much Oda is still being used to fund costs associated with asylum accommodation? The government's manifesto committed to ending use of asylum hotels and saving enormous sums of money.

My Lords, in conclusion, my Lords, the United Kingdom has a vital role to play internationally at a time of growing global need. It is essential that development assistance is not only well spent, but it is humanitarian. Impact is clearly understood and rigorously assessed.
20:18
Baroness Chapman of Darlington Portrait Baroness Chapman of Darlington, Minister of State (Development) (Labour)
-
-
My Lords, I am genuinely grateful to Lord Bates for providing us the opportunity to have this discussion. I think actually it's probably rather actually it's probably rather overdue and there seems to be some pent up frustration and anger in pent up frustration and anger in the chamber about decisions that have been made. And I absolutely hear that he gave us such a vivid account of why this matters, and I honestly could not agree more with the case that he put for the UK, showing global leadership on development and humanitarian assistance.

He is absolutely right to talk to us about how important this is. He spoke of fallacies around the UK's UK public attitudes, and around the sort of hopelessness of all of this. And he's right to do that too. But it's also true, and I think it's important that we remind ourselves of this. It's also true that development and countries and the nature of humanitarian aid that's changed as well. And even if we hadn't cut the budget, we would have to fundamentally rethink how we go about the business of development in 2026 compared to the decisions that were taken, say, in 2005, of which I'm incredibly proud and I'm proud of the role that the then Labour Prime Minister and Chancellor played in that.

But I think the world has changed. But the I think the collective experience of this house has really shone through this evening and the the experience of many, many decades working on this, either as a Minister or in the sector or with Halo. We benefit from hearing all about that. And like people across the country, this chamber cares deeply about the role that government plays. And on behalf of the government, I want to leave you in absolutely no doubt whatsoever that we share that care and commitment to supporting the world's poorest.

I do have to challenge, though, this idea that less money in an older budget has to lead to less action, less impact, and fewer development outcomes. I just do not believe that anymore because as we've already seen this year, the world has changed a lot. It is continuing to change and we can't just stay doing things as we always have done. In the face of that change, I am absolutely focussed on the reform agenda that we need to see in the humanitarian and the development system, and we need that.

So we get the biggest impact for those people that we're working so hard to support. Lord Bates Lord Bates and I think some other noble Lords as well, quoted some figures about our global health spend. I don't think they're quite right. Those numbers I think those numbers are probably relating to our global Health Directorate, but actually we spend more of our money on global health through the Global Fund, through Gavi and those numbers. Those that have been Ministers will remember this. We pay those.

There's not an even spend across the years on those. And actually, we are now the largest contributor to Gavi. We hosted the Global Fund Replenishment. We are at the leading edge of donors on global health globally. And that has not changed. And the proportion of our money that goes on global health I the numbers are finally published. You will see that that has actually increased. And I would just ask those noble Lords opposite with such deep concern about this, to perhaps challenge the leadership of the Conservative Party about what I believe its current position is, is about further reducing spend to 0.1%.

And I even I can't see how you run a development budget on on that amount of money. And Tom Fletcher's name came up a few times as well. It should. He is a strong leader. We're very proud of him. Archer I'm seeing him tomorrow, and I would encourage others who've been invited to to go to the briefing that he's arranged as well, because he's an incredibly strong advocate for this agenda, and he's doing remarkable work at the United Nations. I just want to touch a little bit on the humanitarian context.

Despite huge advances in the last 30 years which have seen extreme poverty fall today, humanitarian needs are rising. And a lot of this, as noble Lords have said, is about conflict. And this year, more than 239 million people will require humanitarian support. And the UN is hyper prioritising 87 million people with the most life threatening needs. Our hearts are absolutely in this agenda, but our heads need to be as well, and we need to do that so that every penny goes where it absolutely is needed.

And we have to make these prioritisation decisions with our budget for the next three years, which we're going to be announcing the allocations very, very soon. But I think it's not true to say that the UK's international reputation is diminished. I think that that's incorrect. And I think that saying that actually, you know, fails to appreciate the way that the world has also changed. And the clear message that we have from partners, particularly in Africa. And we announced our new Africa approach just before Christmas, is that our partner countries want to work with us just as that as partners, and they don't see us as being donors.

They want to take responsibility for their own services, education of their own children, setting up their own health systems. And we can do a lot better than we have done sometimes in the past in supporting countries to do that and to raise more of the money that they need domestically. This is working in Ghana, in Rwanda. We've done some good work on this in Ethiopia and in Kenya. That is how countries want to work with us. It's very, very different to a traditional programming approach.

But on humanitarian spend, we estimate that in 2526 this will be around 1.6 billion. I can answer the Earl of Courtown opposite in Ukraine, Gaza and Sudan. We are going to protect our spending. Ukraine currently has the biggest Oda programme, I think, in history, at £240 million a year. And in Gaza I was asked about access. We are pressing for humanitarian corridors. We're calling on Israel to lift restrictions, to allow the UN and other NGOs to operate, to operate freely and will continue to do that.

We since April as well, our humanitarian crisis reserve has provided £72.5 million in life saving support. And that's about earthquakes in Myanmar and Afghanistan, famine risks across East Africa and Yemen, and the the hurricane in Jamaica. But I think I was quite impressed, actually, by the speech by Baroness D'Souza just explaining the need for evidence based work. I completely agree with that. And we are having to be much more ruthless now about ensuring that everything we do is based on a very good, sound understanding of what works.

We are backing multilateral organisations which have the biggest impact. I think Lord Bruce encouraged us to do this, including through the commitments that we've made to Gavi in the Global Fund, and we are championing reform, particularly at the UN. I meet Tom Fletcher regularly, as I've said, and we are completely supporting the reform agenda that he is proposing. We are clear what we need to see. This is about rigorous prioritisation of those in the greatest need, more streamlining to improve efficiency and value for money, greater focus on upholding international humanitarian law and protecting the vulnerable.

This will give us a more joined up response across humanitarian and development agencies, removing false distinctions which I think hold effective work back too often. And we are going to lead by example on this, reflecting these principles in the UK, decisions that we are making, as Lord Bruce said, we should be working principally when we can with local organisations. Lord McConnell and others encouraged us that the government should increase its spend. Very happy to take that message back to my friend the Chancellor.

I don't think that that's going to be happening anytime soon, but I think we need to use this opportunity that we have now to do the changes that are needed so that when the situation changes, we can get absolute best value out of every penny that we spend. I'm trying to make sure that I don't run over time here. Can I just mention a little bit about technology in the private sector, which I think Lord Bruce also mentioned to us the we need to bring all of the talents of the United Kingdom to bear on this, because this is no longer going to be a situation where the government is the only actor, alongside some NGOs, technology companies, philanthropic organisations, the private sector, our universities, all of the there is a desire, I think, which is far more widespread than we've been able to capitalise on in the past, to be active and leading in, in, in development.

And the government ought to be more of a convenor sometimes than a provider. And we'll be taking that approach forward. We hope to hold an event in the summer where we try and bring all of these people with an interest together. I am going to finish very soon. Baroness Sugg and Baroness Goudie asked us about violence against women and girls, and I'm really glad that they did. They have seen my friend, the Foreign Secretary has called a national and international Violence against women and Girls emergency, and is committed to putting these issues at the heart of of our foreign policy.

The impact assessments, the decisions that we've made will be published in full when we publish our allocations. We've already used those impact assessments to amend some of the decisions that we've made. And I hope that she can see traces of what she believes in when we make those announcements. Lord Herbert said, in relation to TB, that we need to look at systems and multilateral work and that and he's absolutely right. Very happy to meet with him to discuss that further, and also to thank Lord Evans for his work on Halo and de-mining.

And I've had great conversations with his organisation. I'm very pleased to be able to continue to work with them. But finally, just want to say that we do need to continue to back our brave humanitarians around the world, and it's our mission and their mission to get life saving assistance to those in greatest need. There are some of the most remarkable people that I've ever had the privilege to meet. They're engaged in the noblest of causes, in the most difficult of situations.

And I think that that's really no better place to end my remarks than on that note, because I think we all admire and respect what they do, putting their lives often at risk through a desire to support others. And it's the very best of humanity that they embody. And the UK government will continue to support

**** Possible New Speaker ****

them in all they do well. My Lords were not due to return

**** Possible New Speaker ****

My Lords were not due to return to the bill until 2039. I beg to move that the House do now adjourn

**** Possible New Speaker ****

during pleasure. Until that point. The question is that the House adjourn during pleasure until 8:39 p.m. As many as that opinion will say. Content the contrary not say. Content the contrary not
20:31
20:39
20:40
Baroness Foster of Aghadrumsee Portrait Baroness Foster of Aghadrumsee (Non-affiliated)
-
-
To 78. I rise to speak to this group and in particular 372 from group and in particular 372 from the government and 380 to which I have added my name. But before I have added my name. But before I speak to those in terms of three, seven, one, be the amendment in Baroness Blower and Lord Hain name, I have listened very carefully to the differences between may intimidate and the intention to intimidate, and I think, if I may, I think there may be a middle way through this, and I hope that maybe we use the time between committee and report to look at that middle way and perhaps talk about a reasonable person or for lawyers, the man on the Clapham omnibus, how he would see such acts rather than I do accept, may intimidate, may be slightly wide in terms of the purpose piece.

I think it's very, very difficult to prove intention to to intimidate. And we've seen that many times in Northern Ireland. So I just make that suggestion in respect of that. I also listened very carefully to what Lord Hain had to say. Of course, a respected Secretary of State for Northern Ireland when he referred to the inalienable British right to protest. But of course, when he was Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, he knows that the Parades Commission for Northern Ireland were given powers by the government to deal with parades and protests in Northern Ireland.

That, of course, was in the wake of difficulties surrounding parades and the rights of freedom of assembly and those in nationalist areas who didn't want those parades to happen in their areas. And of course, it's no secret that many unionists, including myself, were not supportive of the Parades Commission receiving those powers. What we seen as an unaccountable body taking decisions on parades, many of which have taken place not just for decades but for hundreds of years. But now, the situation since that legislation went through is that everybody that's organising a parade or a protest in Northern Ireland has to put in an 11 bar one form.

It's become a very famous form in Northern Ireland to the police service. We have to notify them that a parade or protest is taking place. We have to tell them the route, we have to tell them the date, the time and the organiser of the parade or the protest so that people can be held accountable. I do not want, in the context of this group, to speak to the merits of the existence or indeed the decision making of the Parades Commission, because I probably would agree with Lord Hain on that.

Although Lord Hain today not Lord Hain when he was Secretary of State for for Northern Ireland, but rather I want to look at what they can consider when making their decisions on whether to place conditions or limit a parade or protest. And I think it is instructive that in my part of the United Kingdom, the body taking decisions on contentious parades or protests can take into account the cumulative impact that such a parade or protest would have on the community.

If I go to the legislation, the Commission, as it's called, may issue a determination in respect of a proposed protest or parade. The conditions may include conditions as to the place at which the meeting will be held, its maximum duration, or the maximum numbers of persons who may constituted, and in considering whether a particular case determination should happen, the Commission has regards to their guidelines and indeed their code of conduct, and in their guidelines, and I have them here.

They take into consideration any disruption to the life of the community which the meeting may cause, or any impact which the meeting may have on relationships within that community. And indeed they do take into account. It says here in the guidelines from the Commission, the frequency of such public processions or related protests along the route. May I say to the noble Lord Lord Hanson, who, like Lord Hain, has served in Northern Ireland, who knows the Parades Commission, who knows the powers of the Parades Commission? Surely there is there some precedent in terms of how contentious parades should be considered? I'm not suggesting that you set up a Parades Commission in England and Wales, because I'd probably object to it in the same way as I object to the one in Northern Ireland.

But I'm talking about the principles that they act on, which I think should be looked at, and I make my comments to be helpful to the Ministers in this regard, who are very aware of the Parades Commission and whatever. My misgivings on the accountability of the Parades Commission, those principles could be applied by a senior police officer or indeed the Secretary of State. And I think if we're looking at principles for the committee to think about and again, between committee and report, we might think about this.

I think the impact of on communities is all already operating in Northern Ireland. As I say, I make no mention of my support for the commission, but I think it is important to look at the legislation that was set up, the principles that are there, because I think the government amendment and number amendment 380 just continue that piece of work that has happened in Northern Ireland. And it's instructive, actually, as to how this can work. So I hope that is helpful in terms of the amendments that have been put forward.

And I very much support the government's amendment and the amendment three in my name.
20:46
Lord Strasburger Portrait Lord Strasburger (Liberal Democrat)
-
-
I rise to speak on amendments 372 and 380 and various other amendments in this group. But before I do, I'd like to thank before I do, I'd like to thank noble Lord Lord Hanson for his kind remarks at the end of the last group. But I do fear that after this speech, normal service might be resumed. There are many issues to cover in this group, and I'll try to be as brief as possible. So government amendment 372 would amend the Public Order Act 1986 to impose on a duty on the police to consider so-called cumulative disruption caused by repeated protests in a given area.

The amendment would give the police unprecedented powers to restrict or prohibit protests if these are expected to be too disruptive by Lord Trees. Amendments represent a grievous attack on the right to protest, a right that is vital to our democracy. Democracy and it has many unintended consequences. As I shall outline, the over overly broad framework would empower the police to routinely kerb freedom of expression and assembly as exercised through peaceful protest. They would significantly expand the definition of serious disruption to include so-called cumulative disruption caused by repeated protests in an area.

This would allow the police to pre-emptively prohibit peaceful demonstrations if, in their opinion, an area has been the site of too many protests, which is an extremely broad discretion. Until this debate started. By the way, I had no idea that this provision is aimed at frequent protests outside synagogues. The amendment says nothing to that effect, and it has very broad application to all protests. So I shall carry on on that basis. Presumably it would apply if the protests in question were organised by different groups who advocate for different causes.

This could create a first come, first serve version of free speech, where areas are given what could be described as a protest allowance at the whim of the local constabulary. Police would be within their rights to prohibit peaceful assemblies once that allowance had been used up. This opens up the concerning opportunity for groups of citizens to censor their political opponents by using up an area's protest allowance, before their opponents have had a chance to protest themselves. Furthermore, as has already been said this evening, the amendment is silent on what constitutes an area.

We don't know whether this power would permit the police to move a demonstration to a different part of the square, to another part of town, or even to a different difficult to reach rural area, resulting in decreased attendance and visibility. Perhaps the Minister could enlighten the committee on that. Similarly, amendment 372 does not specify within what time frame disruption would have to be repeated to be considered cumulative. This is another question for the Minister. The suggestion that so-called cumulative disruption should be taken into account in considering conditions for restrictions or prohibitions of process protests, is also disproportionate.

Could the Minister please explain why one person's right to protest should be extinguished, simply because somebody else has already protested in the same location about the same cause, or about a different cause? What about causes that evolve or develop over time, legitimately calling for further protest to coincide with the next stage of public debate? The courts have also repeatedly concluded that a relevant consideration in considering the proportionality of article ten and article 11 rights is whether the views giving rise to the protest relate to quotes very important issues that would de facto be more likely to apply to causes which have led to repeated protests than it would to causes that have given rise to a single protest.

So this power, if enacted, gives the police an additional power to ban or curtail protest on the most important causes, the ones most worthy of protest, the ones most protected by the courts. Could the Minister please explain if that is the intention? Amendment 372 is poorly drafted. It is far too broad to prevent the problems I've described, and it gives police far too much power to curtail or prevent peaceful protests on the most important matters. My Lords Government amendment three, 72 and three and 380 should be withdrawn or, if necessary, voted down.

Turning to a government amendment 381. This creates a new offence about protesting outside the homes of public office holders. Now why this may be sensible. Should it not have a reasonable contact defence conduct? Sorry, I'll say that again. Should it not have a reasonable conduct defence as appears in other harassment type offences to cover, for example, situations where a neighbour speaks amicably to a politician about a local issue as they're leaving home. Is it proportionate to criminalise that perfectly normal interaction? Another question for the Minister on clause one, two, four, which which caused so much heat rather than light earlier on? It goes without saying, the Lords, that worshippers must be free to access their place of worship, be they synagogues, mosques, churches or whatever, and worshippers must be able to do so without intimidation or threats or fear of the same.

But those rights are already fully protected by the Public Order Act 1986. Under the act, conditions may be imposed on protests by a senior police officer if they believe that the procession may result in serious public disorder, or where the purpose of the organisers is the intimidation of others. And clause 12, a 12 two of the act specifically includes places of worship. So clause one, two, four of this bill may be completely unnecessary, and the amendments tabled by Baroness Blower and Lord Hain, which seek to clarify what is meant by in the vicinity.

They're all well and good, but just about every place where people demonstrate is close to a church or other place of worship. For example, Parliament Square and Trafalgar Square would fail the test. Clause one, two, four could enable the police to ban or restrict just about any protest on that basis. That is probably not the intention, but it will be the result. If you with you in a moment. My Lords, amendment 378A in the name of Lord Walney would allow restrictions to be placed on protests or assembly if they take place in the vicinity of places used for democratic decision making.

But given the high standing of the noble Lord Lord Walney in this House, I find this idea rather strange. It would restrict process close to Parliament, which is where the people who make the decisions, the people that the protesters most want to influence, are to be found. The whole point of protest is to engage in a democratic process and seek to persuade decision makers to a particular point of view. If anything, protest is more proportionate where it takes place in the vicinity of decision makers, there is no sensible argument for amendment 378A and it should be rejected.

Turning briefly to amendment 370 A, I understand that the idea of designating as extreme criminal protest groups is something that Lord Walney has been advocating for a long time. I oppose it because it is an oppressive and draconian restriction on the right to protest, in essence, banning specific protest organisations. It is, of course, right that the law steps in to criminalise unlawful protest activity, but this is already done frequently on an individual basis, criminalising association with others who share the same cause is wholly disproportionate.

Not everyone associated with a group shares any criminal intent, designation or restriction of ECP would only serve to criminalise other law abiding citizens because of their shared, but reasonably held political views about a particular cause. Why Lord Tope? Taken as a whole, this group of amendment extends the regressive and anti-democratic tendencies of the previous government and now this one to suppress, suppress or ban legitimate and peaceful protest in whatever way they can. Substantial pruning is required to get this bill into a state where it is no longer threatens our cherished democratic processes.

Peaceful process educates the public. It sparks debate. It creates the pressure needed for reform. In a healthy democracy, disagreement is not a threat, but a sign that citizens care deeply about their society.
20:56
Baroness O'Grady of Upper Holloway Portrait Baroness O'Grady of Upper Holloway (Labour)
-
-
My Lords. >> My Lords. >> My Lords, I rise to support what I understand to be probing I understand to be probing amendment standing in the name of Baroness Blower. But first I want to seek clarifications from my to seek clarifications from my noble friend, the Minister on Government, amendment 372. And I do so from the perspective of someone who has had direct responsibility for organising mass demonstrations. When I was at the TUC, which now could be caught in this net first, perhaps the Minister can clarify the definition of disruption and whether that applies to conduct or location and the safeguards that will be applied under cumulative impact to ensure that any restrictions and conditions imposed by the police are proportionate, as cumulative impact, as we've heard, will be applied collectively to demonstration organisers.

This could lead to a rationing of protests in a particular area, presumably even when they are entirely peaceful. So, in practical terms, can the Minister explain how such a Russian would be distributed between, as we've heard, potentially very different organisations with very different aims, who will decide and on what basis, or are organisations supposed to figure it out for themselves. In central London, there are really only 1 or 2 routes available for very large demonstrations, which have viable assembly points at the start and finish.

So for national demonstrations, how realistic is it for the Home Office to suggest, as it did in a press release, that the police could instruct organisers to divert their demonstrations to alternative routes? When in central London there may be none. And, crucially, can the Minister tell us whether consideration of the cumulative impact of demonstrations will be weighed against the public's right to protest in response to the cumulative impact of real world events, for example, hundreds of thousands of people turned out for successive TUC marches through the 20 tens.

I recognise not everybody here may have joined them, but plenty did, and this was in response to the mounting harm that austerity and public service cuts were inflicting on workers, families and communities. More recently, hundreds of thousands have joined demonstrations in solidarity with the Palestinian people. Again, the frequency of these very large protests is not happening in a vacuum, nor is it divorced from the strength of public feeling. While the International Court of Justice may not reach its verdict on genocide in Gaza for some years, according to a YouGov poll published in June last year, much of the UK population has already made its mind up.

Has the government really considered the societal impact of making expression through peaceful protest much, much more difficult? Turning briefly to Baroness Blowers amendment, in my practical experience, it is absolutely vital that the law supports constructive negotiations between the police and demonstration organisers about the route and arrangements for the march, and they must, I absolutely agree, be sensitive to and take proper account of community concerns. But again, that would become much harder if vague terms like in the vicinity are enshrined in law.

As we know, there are literally thousands of places of worship in our capital city. A broad interpretation of that term would make it nigh impossible to hold a march through central London. There is a fear, as we saw in that civil society statement supported by the TUC, that such imprecise language could become a license to ban protest by the back door. If not under this government, then under a future one. Of course, any incidents of violence, antisemitism, Islamophobia or any other form of racism are of course, intolerable.

But the law already provides the police and courts with powers to deal with harassment, threats and incitement. And it would be quite wrong to use the imperative of tackling that behaviour by some as justification for curtailing everyone's freedom of assembly. Baroness Blower sensible amendments seek to provide much needed clarity and certainty, both for demonstration organisers and for the police. Historically, the right to peaceful protest was hard won. Each of us may support or vehemently oppose the aims of a particular demonstration, but we should all agree that the right to peaceful protest must be meaningful, and it must be protected as an essential hallmark of a free and democratic society.
21:02
Lord Blencathra Portrait Lord Blencathra (Conservative)
-
-
I. >> Have one. >> Large amendment in this group, and I thought I'd wait till near the end before speaking to it, or the end before speaking to it, or what might be close to the end with a bit of luck, because it's different from others in the group I had considered regrouping. I wish I had considered regrouping. I wish I had now to deal with it at lunchtime on Thursday. But but before dealing with noise, may I say what a privilege it was to sit here and listen to that very powerful speech by the Lord Mendelssohn, who's not currently in his place.

The wise words, the noble and learned and Lord Pannick, and my noble friend Lord Pollock. And what struck me about something Lord Polak said, when we hear the chance of support the intifada, and from the river to the sea, these are not just catchy phrases for protest marches. What they mean is kill the Jews, destroy the state of Israel, and wipe out 8 million people. Well, you can't get anything more evil as a hate crime than that. However, my Lords, my amendment is different because it's it's it's I think it's a terribly important one, if I may say so, because it imposes a duty on the Metropolitan Police to ensure access to Parliament.

There have been disturbing incidents in recent years where the met have failed, and MPs and peers could not access our home of democracy or had to run the gauntlet of a mob. Now I need to take Lords through the recent history of this problem, to let us see how we've got to the current state and what I think we can do about it. My Lords, the minutes of our state opening on 17th of July, 2426 session, state stoppages in the streets, it was ordered that the Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis to take care that the passages through the streets leading to this house be kept free and open, and that no obstruction be permitted to handle the hinder the passage of Lords to and from this House during the sitting of Parliament, or to hinder Lords in the pursuit of their parliamentary duties on the parliamentary estate, and that the Lady Usher of the Black Rod, attending this House to communicate this order to the commissioner, unquote, that's our sessional order, which the Metropolitan Police Commissioner enforces primarily through section 52 of the Metropolitan Police Act of 1839.

And that allows the police to issue directions to prevent street obstruction near Parliament during sittings. Now, the Commons, my Lords, used to pass the same motion until and stop doing it in 2005, because in 2003, the House of Commons Procedure Committee concluded that passing the Sessional Order did not confer any extra legal powers on the police, and the only way to ensure the police had the adequate powers to achieve the result, intended by the Sessional Order, was through legislation. The committee recommended that until such legislation come into force, the House should continue with sessional order in modified form, in order to reflect the House's concerns and to act as a marker that it expects members access to Parliament to be maintained as far as existing law allows.

Now, My Lords, the government implemented that and included provisions in the Serious and Organised Crime Act of 2005 intended to meet that requirement identified by the Committee, and the House of Commons dropped the Sessional Order then in 2005. Now in 2013, another joint committee on Parliamentary privilege recommended that the practice of passing sessional orders in the House of Commons be restored. In its response, the government said it was not convinced that the revival would serve any legal or practical purpose. The government is legally right, my Lords.

The Sessional Orders are not statute law and have no legal effect. But they had a massive symbolic effect, and the met used to keep access free for all members of both houses. Now, restrictions on protests around Parliament were introduced under the 2005 act in sections one, three, 2 to 1, three, eight, and in those sections it said the Commissioner must give authorisation for the demonstrations to which the notice relates, and giving that authorisation, the Commissioner should try and ensure as far as possible that people had were free to enter Parliament.

So, my Lords, we moved from a instruction that no hindrance must must be permitted to one where the Commissioner could decide on a case by case basis to grant a protest. Now, these clauses, in fact, and 3238 were abolished by the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Act of 2011, section 141, and replaced with restrictions applied only to the controlled area of Parliament Square, which was delineated for the first time. And that was and what is and is very sensible now under section 143 of the 211 act, it is no longer an offence for demonstrations to be held without the authorisation of the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, but a constable or authorised officer, who has reasonable grounds for believing that a person is doing, or is about to do a prohibited activity, may direct the person to cease doing that activity or not to start doing that activity now.

Lords. My Lords, not the term prohibited activity. Much of the emphasis of the clauses in that act are about tents and equipment in Parliament Square, and the controlled use of Whitehall and loudspeakers by Lords. Why was that? Older members of the House will recall that for ten years a mr. Ben Hall had an anti-war tent on the grass opposite the Member of Parliament entrance at the carriage gates, and the government and MPs were very vexed that there seemed to be absolutely nothing they could do about it, and no law to remove them.

And that, my Lords, is the thrust of the parliamentary provisions in the 2011 act to deal with that one man and his tent. I believe he died, actually, just as the act came into force by accident, the need to secure access to Parliament became downgraded once again, and the emphasis was on on prohibiting tents and accoutrements and loudspeakers outside the Commons. Now, my Lords, technically the Metropolitan Police Commissioner and his officers have the full legal powers to ensure that MPs, peers, officers and staff have free and unfettered access at all times.

But the reality is that the duty to do so has been subliminally watered down. Over the years. We have moved from a position that protests outside parliament had to have permission to one where they did not need permission, but the met could stop them if they thought it necessary. Indeed, there is no duty for free and unfettered access, and that is why my amendment is necessary without disturbing 99% of the current controls, powers and responsibilities. Why is it necessary, my Lords? Well, in November 2021, Insulate Britain, with more than 60 activists, blocked two main roads leading to the parliamentary estate, including Bridge Street and Peers Entrance.

In April 2019, Extinction Rebellion blocked access in Parliament Square and the police had to take action to maintain a clear route for access for MPs and peers from reaching the estate. In October 2022, Just Stop Oil as part of a month long occupation of Westminster, activists sat in the road surrounding Parliament Square, specifically aiming to disrupt access to the seat of government. My Lords, then the police, crime, Sentencing and Courts Act of 19 of 2022 added an offensive blocking vehicular access to the parliamentary estate.

But it said nothing about pedestrians. So, my Lord, the current laws are slightly inadequate. The first thing the Metropolitan Police Commissioner will see in my new clause. Other words, the duty of the Metropolitan Police to ensure access to Parliament. It begins. It is the duty of the Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis to secure that members of either House of Parliament, all parliamentary officers and staff, have free and unfettered access to the Palace of Westminster controlled area on any day in which either House is sitting.

My Lords, that puts access to Parliament front and centre of the legislation, sending a very strong signal that democracy trumps protest still protests if you want to, but don't block access to Parliament now under the Lords, there is no right of protest. If I can say to the noble Lord, the Lord Hain. The Humans Rights Act of 1998 does not refer to a right of protest. The relevant rights are the right to freedom of expression. Article ten and the right to freedom of peaceful assembly, article 11.

Moreover, those articles ten and 11 are qualified rights in that they can be restricted when it is necessary and proportionate to protect public safety, prevent crime, and protect the rights and freedoms of others. My Lords, I submit that the rights and freedoms of others include members and staff of both houses, and we should be protected as well to do our job, because we are some of the we are the others. We've allowed a myth to grow, that there's a right to block access to Parliament as part of a non-existent right to protest.

I have a few other small amendments. The 211 act designates the controlled area around Parliament, but does not stretch as far as one. Millbank, which did not open until after the 2011 act was passed. I've included it and also the road from Downing Street to Parliament. Since the current law states that Parliament Square is part of Parliament Street, is part of the of the controlled area, but Downing Street may be in that no man's land between Whitehall and Parliament. The 22 act added an offence of blocking vehicular access, and I've added the pedestrian access for members and staff must be maintained, and a requirement that any protesters must be kept back at least ten metres from pavements used by members to access Parliament, not stopping protests, but just letting peers and members get in.

My Lords, apart from these small changes, I've retained the whole structure of the existing legislation, but with a new duty requirement on the med putting that sentence at the beginning of the legislation, that it is the duty of the Metropolitan Police to secure access to Parliament is more than just tokenistic or symbolic. We've allowed our freedoms to access and egress Parliament without hindrance to be eroded. Over the last 20 years, we permitted a belief that people protesting outside our gates have more rights and are more important than the legislators working inside.

My Lords, it cannot be acceptable that the very people entrusted with the responsibility to ensure our legal rights and freedoms under the law cannot get into the building to do it. My new clause restores that balance. It makes it clear to the Commissioner what his primary duty lies, and it should make it safer for all of us as parliamentarians and staff to carry out our duties. I commend my

**** Possible New Speaker ****

new clause to the House. My Lords, this huge group was always going to be a pivotal one always going to be a pivotal one for us to discuss, and for me, it's just full of moral dilemmas. On many of the amendments. I'm genuinely torn. I don't know where I stand on some of them, and I stand on some of them, and therefore I appreciate the debates that we've had so far, and I think it's been very worthwhile to hear it's been very worthwhile to hear the different sides of the argument.

When the noble Lord, Lord Mendelson, spoke earlier, he kind of stirred me up. But every time I say stirred up, I think of stirred up, stirring up hatred. So it wasn't that. But I mean, his contribution was very important because he emphasised that a lot is at stake and I think a lot is at stake. I said on the first day of committee that I knew that simply reiterating the formal importance of the right to protest was just not sufficient in the period that we're living in, because we're facing new types of protests, we're facing some pretty vicious and abusive gatherings, calling themselves pro protests.

And that leaves something like somebody like me in a difficult dilemma. I'm a free speech. But then I have witnessed the visceral rise of Jew hatred in public and on our streets. And so I'm tall and I have a lot of sympathy with the intentions of the noble Lords. Lord Walney Pollock, Leigh of Hurley, Lord Pannick, Baroness Foster, just to name some of them. And I understand where they're coming from. But as the noble Lord, Lord Mendelson himself admitted, there are a lot of existing powers that aren't used.

And that strikes me as the problem. And my fear is that we have a policing crisis, powers not used for cultural or deeper political reasons, and that what we do is we try and compensate by making more laws. And I think that actually that is not going to be able to solve the problem of the cultural normalisation of anti-Semitism. If anything, those new laws that could also not be enforced could be a distraction. So despite my reservations, my fear is that the deeper problem can lead to bad lawmaking and abandoning key principles that I think stand up for Western civilisation, democracy and so on, because we're so desperate to do something.

Laws driven by reaction, by the way, to specific issues can go very wrong. I've noticed that in Australia, in the wake of the Bondi Beach massacre and all that happened, what law have they come up with? Islamophobia as a hate crime where you get five years in prison. So sometimes law making isn't the right answer. And this is, on the other hand, a huge and disparate group. And so I want to tentatively support and ask some questions on others. I tentatively support the amendments in the name of the noble Lady Baroness Blower and the noble Lord, Lord Hain, in their attempt at specificity in tightening up the wording of clause four and the restriction on protests at places of worship.

And that just seems sensible, because so much of this bill suffers from far too broad a language. So keep leaving out in the vicinity and inserting within 50m of the outer perimeter, or
This debate has concluded
Return to start of debate - Return to top of page