Lords Chamber

Thursday 15th January 2026

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11:08
None Portrait Introduction(s): Baroness Hyde of Bemerton; Lord Roe of West Wickham
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Charles Charles III, Charles III, by Charles III, by the Charles III, by the Grace Charles III, by the Grace of Charles III, by the Grace of God Charles III, by the Grace of God of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and of her other realms and territories. King, head of the Commonwealth. Defender of the Faith to all Lords, spiritual and temporal, and all other subjects whatsoever to whom these presents shall come. Greeting. Know ye that we of our special grace, certain knowledge, and mere motion, in pursuance of the Life Peerages Act 1958, and of all other powers, in that behalf us enabling do by these presents advance, create and prefer our trusty and well beloved Sara Kathryn Sabres Hyde to the state degree, style, dignity, title and honour of Baroness Hyde of Bemerton of Kings Cross in our London Borough of Islington.

And for us, our heirs and successors do appoint, give and grant unto her the said name, state, degree, style, dignity, title and honour of Baroness Hyde of Bemerton to have and to hold unto her for her life willing and by these presents granting for us our heirs and successors, that she may have, hold, and possess a seat, place, and voice in Parliament and public assemblies and councils of us, our heirs and successors within our United Kingdom, amongst the Barons, and also that she may enjoy and use all the rights, privileges, Preeminences, immunities and advantages to the degree of a Baron duly and of right belonging, which Barons of our United Kingdom have heretofore used and enjoyed, or, as they do at present, use and enjoy.

In witness whereof we have caused these our letters to be made patent witness ourself at Westminster in the afternoon of the 12th day of January, in the fourth year of our reign, by warrant under the King's

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sign-manual. I. Sara Baroness Hyde of

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I. Sara Baroness Hyde of Bemerton, do swear by Almighty God that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to His Majesty King Charles, his heirs and successors

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Charles Charles III, Charles III, by Charles III, by the Charles III, by the grace Charles III, by the grace of Charles III, by the grace of God

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Charles III, by the grace of God of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and of her other realms and territories. of her other realms and territories. King, head of the Commonwealth, defender of the Faith to all Lords, defender of the Faith to all Lords, spiritual and temporal, and all other our subjects. Whatsoever to whom these presents shall come. whom these presents shall come. Greeting. Know ye that we of our especial grace, certain knowledge, and mere motion, in pursuance of the Life Peerages Act 1958, and of all other powers, in that behalf us enabling do by these presents advance, create and prefer our trusty and well-beloved Andrew Dudley Roe to the state degree, style, dignity, title and honour of Baron Rowe, of West Wickham, of West Wickham, in our London Borough of Bromley.

And for us, our heirs and successors, to appoint, give and grant unto him the said name, state, degree, style, dignity, title and honour of Baron Rowe, of West Wickham, to have and to hold unto him for his life willing and by these presents granting for us our heirs and successors, that he may have, hold and possess a seat, place, and voice in the parliaments and public assemblies and councils of us, our heirs and successors within our United Kingdom, amongst the Barons, and also that he may enjoy and use all the rights, privileges, Preeminences, immunities and advantages to the degree of a Baron duly and of right belonging, which Barons of our United Kingdom have heretofore used and enjoyed, or, as they do at present, use and enjoy.

In witness whereof we have caused these our letters to be made patent witness ourself at Westminster in the afternoon of the 13th day of January, in the fourth year of our reign, by warrant under the King's sign-manual. I.

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Andrew Lord Roe of West Wickham, do swear by Almighty God that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to His Majesty King Charles, his heirs and successors Charles, his heirs and successors

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First First Oral First Oral Question First Oral Question Lord First Oral Question Lord Harris

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First Oral Question Lord Harris of Haringey. My Lords, I draw attention to my registered interest as chair of the National Preparedness Commission
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Lord Coaker Portrait Lord Coaker, The Minister of State, Ministry of Defence (Labour)
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I'm not going to comment on the operation of of Special forces, and the Baroness in her previous role wouldn't have done that either, however nicely it was asked. Let me just let me, let me let me just say there are I mean, I outlined in one other noble Lords about the money that is being spent, but I mean, we're we're developing munitions factories that will be money spent on that. There's a defence housing strategy. There will be money spent on that.

The typhoon and T26 deals are enabling imports and monies to be spent there. The Dragonfire laser system, we're spending money on that new drone factories. There's a new program, as I say, to build factories. We're spending billions of pounds on the nuclear deterrent. There are all sorts of money's being spent. And whilst we're talking about this, let's just also reflect on what our armed forces have done in the last few few months, notwithstanding the fact that this debate is about the budget, and we've seen RAF typhoons take action in Syria, we've seen the the carrier strike group, we've seen the commitment to the coalition of the willing.

We've seen forces in in Estonia and elsewhere. So there's considerable and the support to the American action to to deal with the Shadow fleet, all of those I know, supported by the noble Baroness. And so I know I understand the point of Lord Young's question, but I also take the point. We should also reflect on what we do do, as well as the challenges that this country faces.

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My Lords, that concludes oral questions for today. This might be a moment when noble Lords who wish Odds. Odds. We Odds. We now Odds. We now come Odds. We now come to Odds. We now come to an Odds. We now come to an instrument previously debated in Grand previously debated in Grand Committee. I think we are Amendment. England and Wales ordered 2025 Lord Lemos.
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Lord Callanan Portrait Lord Callanan (Conservative)
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Lord Watts time is now up for that question. We now come to questions on a statement made in

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the House of Commons on Tuesday the 13th of January on Iran, and we start with the front benchers. My Lords, the.

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My Lords, the. Situation in Iran is very fast moving and there have been significant developments since the significant developments since the original statement by the government last Tuesday. Before moving on to the specific questions moving on to the specific questions I would like to raise with the noble Baroness, the Minister, I think I would like to take a moment think I would like to take a moment to reflect on the incredible bravery of the Iranian people who have taken to the streets day after day in protest against the cruel, barbaric and despotic regime that currently resides in Tehran.

Too often, my Lords, we in this country take our long held freedoms for granted and forget that across the world there are fearless protesters literally risking their lives for nothing more than freedom and democracy. It is truly humbling. Those protesters, they face brutal treatment by the regime. Over 2000 people have been killed, but still they are standing up bravely against that brutality and oppression. Against the backdrop of the appalling actions of the Iranian regime. Could the noble Baroness, the Minister, please update the House on the actions that the government is taking to hold Iran to account? What further steps are Ministers considering to ensure that the Iranian regime is subject to the appropriate additional sanctions? We welcome the fact that the Iranian ambassador has now been summoned.

Can the noble Baroness please confirm whether the case of Erfan Soltani was raised with him? Last night, it was reported that the British embassy in Tehran has been closed temporarily. Can the Minister please update the House on the work that the embassy staff are doing and currently undertaking to support British citizens currently still in Iran, and how they will retain that support as they move to operating remotely? How will embassy staff support Craig and Lindsay Forman, who have been currently detained in Iran? Could we please have an update on their case? We have also seen reports that the government are withdrawing some personnel from the Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar.

This is the first opportunity we have had to ask questions about these decisions. Could the noble Baroness please update the House on the reasons for that decision, and when the limited withdrawal of personnel will be completed? On the actions of the US, we know that President Trump has been forthright in his public challenges to the Iranian regime. Could the Minister please confirm what conversations have taken place between the UK government officials and Ministers and their US counterparts? Will we work in lockstep with our American allies in giving robust response to these events in Iran? And has the Prime Minister spoken to President Trump directly to discuss our response? Finally, I would like to reiterate our support for the protestors in Iran who are so bravely standing up for freedom and democracy at the risk of the ultimate personal sacrifice.

Their behaviour of the Iranian regime is truly horrific, and we support the government in their decision to summon the ambassador. Ministers must continue to work at pace to hold the regime in Tehran to account for their brutal oppression of those brave protesters fighting for liberty and democracy.
12:17
Lord Purvis of Tweed Portrait Lord Purvis of Tweed (Liberal Democrat)
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We must show solidarity and support the young Iranians in seeking democratic rights, and we must protect those such as journalists and those within the BBC World Service Radio who are working to ensure that there is information which can be life saving in times of crisis. Can the Minister update the House on the status of BBC Persia service? I think we all supported the emergency support for there being radio provision at a time of internet blackouts.

Can the Minister update us as to the availability of information for the Iranian civilian population? We must also ensure this time that joint British joint nationals are protected. Can the Minister update us on what consular support may continue to be available? I do support the government's actions on making sure that our diplomats are protected, but what kind of consular support will be ongoing and in extreme circumstances, especially for victims who are young women who are being particularly targeted? These benches believe that there does need to be a safe and legal route for asylum, potentially, which we do not currently have.

Any government which has religious morality police is one in which instinctively liberals are wary of, but one which uses its organs of state to be repressive, to regress, repress, to imprison and torture peaceful protesters, target young women and murder. Those simply wanting a say on who governs them needs to be condemned in the strongest terms. The civilians in Iran are also having to grapple with unreliable and contradictory information from President Trump from the United States.

As I mentioned, I support the UK precautionary actions on its diplomatic staff within Iran and indeed on those within Qatar. But I have not heard so far on advice for those within Baghdad and Basra in Iraq. Having frequently visited the border of Iran in that area, we I know that any impact, any turmoil in Iran will have an impact in that area. So if the Minister could update on our advice for southern Iraq, that would be helpful. But as we have seen just yesterday on Venezuela, President Trump is happy to work with autocrats as long as they are his autocrats.

And it doesn't offer much faith to liberal governance. And for those protesters. Can the Minister assure us that the British government wants to see open, fair, democratic governance within Iran, not simply a regime which will offer oil rights to one of our allies? And finally, on sanctions, which we support and we will support the government enhancing the work even further. But we do not support the lack of a prescription of the IRGC. In October, when we discussed the Iran country regulations, I pointed out a loophole, and I will add one today, which I hope the Minister might respond to.

Our sanctions are on individuals and in trade and goods, but they do not cover intermediaries or brokers or those who facilitate funds to the religious police or the IRGC. Those sanctions are not under the human rights regime. They are under trade regimes. The human rights regimes can be expanded rapidly to ensure that those facilitating human rights abuses can also be covered. So in considering, I know the Minister will say that she will not comment, but can she comment on the fact that we are open to considering the human rights regime for sanctions, not just trade sanctions, but that is catered for under the countrywide? And the second loophole is that the lack of prescription for the IRGC means that those who provide support or provide financial assistance to the IRGC are also outwith scope of UK actions.

I hope the Minister will agree that if there are any loopholes we must close them.
12:22
Baroness Chapman of Darlington Portrait Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Labour)
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Frontbenches about the. are taking to the streets at considerable risk to themselves and risking their lives, and in many cases that we know of so far, sacrificing their lives because they wish to live in freedom, and they have every right to express this through protest as they are, and it is met with dismay and shock. And I think the more that communications do become possible at the moment, we know that there are around. We think we know that an estimates for around 2000 dead and around 10,000 are being detained.

It's expected that when more is known and communications become more possible, that that those numbers may well increase. We've made the UK has made statements alongside France and Germany and others. We stay very closely in contact with us, with the US and other allies and partners. We have withdrawn UK based embassy staff for obvious reasons, and this inevitably limits considerably the assistance, the consular assistance that we're able to provide to UK nationals. We've advised for some time against all travel to Iran and the assistance that we will be able to provide should anybody there get into difficulty or need support is it's incredibly limited.

We do advise that those there make plans to leave. It's very difficult if they want, particularly if they wish to leave over land, because we advise against all travel to many of those neighbouring regions as well. I'm asked about personnel in Qatar. I don't know the answer to that. I can find out and I'm very happy to update the house on that. Should that be appropriate. On the issue of sanctions, we are actively considering what next steps we need to take on sanctions, and noble Lords will notice the difference in that comment than the one they usually receive.

But I'm unable to say any more about that, and we are considering measures in respect of prescription like measures in respect of the IRGC. Jonathan Hall is noble Lords will know has recently reviewed this. I'm advised that there is a need to make amendments to the legal framework that's available, because our current prescription measures are the legislation is designed not to deal with state backed entities. So that would need some some amendment. But I think it's it's I hinted at that the other day.

And I think it's just important to be clear about where we are on that. On wider travel advice, we would encourage people to constantly monitor the advice on the FCDO website because there is every chance that this may well be revised, but those decisions are taken very, very quickly and the the information is, is almost instantly available to the public. And on the future vision for Iran, I think this is a really important question, and our vision is entirely centred on the fact that it is for the people of Iran to make their own choice about how they wish to be governed.

That is not something that they have at the moment, but I think it's not for the United Kingdom to say what that the government, government of Iran ought to comprise of and who that ought to be. And different people in this House, I'm sure, will have very strongly held views about that. But from the government's perspective, our principle that will guide us is that it is for the people of Iran to make that choice. My Lord.
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Baroness Chapman of Darlington Portrait Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Labour)
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The analysis that I've seen does suggest that this current situation has peaked, but I our interpretation of that, and I suspect this would be shared across the house, is that that is not any diminution in the desire of the the protesters to see an improvement in their situation and their ability to live in freedom. It's because so many are losing their lives, and it's a decision to stay at home because of fear. And I think how this how this is going to progress, nobody really knows.

But there is no doubt, as he he says, that these protests have been far more wide ranging than that which we have seen previously. Our position in relation to Iran would clearly change should there be a regime that enables us, the population, to live in freedom? We are slightly mindful. Well, noble Lords know because we've discussed this previously. We do take into account the fact that the regime in Iran weaponizes things that we say in order to stack up the false narrative that they purport that these protests are in some way orchestrated by external forces.

Clearly they're not. But we do need to take that into account. And we do have British nationals being held in Iran as well. And we don't want to to do things that would further jeopardise their situation. But I do agree with him that this does look and feel very different to that which we've seen before. And I think that that perception will only increase once communication becomes possible again.
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Lord Leigh of Hurley Portrait Lord Leigh of Hurley (Conservative)
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try and improve section one, two, four. It's worth reminding ourselves that this section seeks to amend section 12 of the Public Order Act, 1986. Curiously, that clause itself was amended in 2022 to allow the senior police officer to impose conditions on a march if it resulted in serious disruption to the life of the community in particular, where it results in a significant delay to the delivery of a time sensitive product to consumers, or disruption of access to any essential goods or services to be delivered to places of worship.

Somewhat strange that the the act was amended to allow goods and services to be delivered, but didn't mention disruption to the actual services themselves. So this section one, two, four is a great improvement and a great help. However, I wish to draw attention to the noble Lord, the Minister and and Lord Katz that the section is dependent upon the actions of a senior police officer who may, and the act is specific in the word, may decide to take action, with the emphasis being that he may not.

I guess he's not required so to do so. The Home Office will be still totally and solely reliant on the decisions of the senior police officer to be put into action. There is no override. Envisage that the Home Office can apply, and I believe that whilst I'm on my feet, this also applies to Lord Hanson's Amendment 37 two. Exactly the same point applies. It's again, a senior police officer may choose to do this, so I would suggest it does not deal with the problem that when complaints are made by by members of the public, politicians currently simply put their hands up and say it's nothing to do with us.

This is a police matter. And as we've seen in the West Midlands, we can't rely on the police in every instance to do their duty and act fairly. The risk of repeating myself. This is the third time I've raised this point in the debates on this bill, and in the previous two discussions, I haven't really had an answer from from the noble Lords Minister. In actual fact, I'm not expecting for them to answer it right now. What I'm asking is for a commitment to consider this point, reflect on it, possibly meet those with an interest in the matter, and for it to be addressed by the time of report.

So my amendments are needed so we can be sure that if protesters are banned from being near synagogues, they are stopped from simply heading towards Jewish faith schools and Jewish community centres. Of course, if my amendments protect schools and community centres of other faiths, then I would be absolutely delighted. So I hope these amendments will receive support from all sides of the House. Disappointingly, there isn't a bishop on the bench because, in my view, places of worship of all denominations need to be addressed by this bill.

So make no mistake, my Lords, Jewish people are leaving the UK as they no longer feel safe, particularly with the marches threatening to come back. I was in Israel last week on a parliamentary conservative Friends of Israel trip, and Israelis were asking me, is it safe to be in London or Manchester anymore? Business people, academics, scientists, tourists, clerics are all nervous about coming to the UK. And as we know, by the way, the marches in Westcliff on Sea led to synagogue attendance falling, which cannot be acceptable.

So we now need to be ahead of the protesters, not behind them. We need to protect faith schools and community centres. And indeed, there have already been protests outside a Jewish community centre. There's one called Jw3, which I support, had a protest outside it on October the 21st, October 24th, 27th, and there were unpleasant and aggressive slogans, and the police were powerless to move them on. Ironically, they were protesting at an event which was a conference to talk about future peace progress with Palestinian representatives speaking.

My amendments attempt to pre-empt what we fear will happen after clause 124 is passed. I have the support of the Board of Deputies for British Jews. I have support from the Jewish Leader Council, where I declare I serve as a vice President and I have support from the Community Security Trust. All of these organisations would urge these amendments to be passed. Now. As Lord Walney said the other day, these proposals do not conflict with anything the McDonald review might say, and the government needs no persuasion of this because the government has itself proposed clause one, two, four and amendment 372, all of which would ordinarily be covered by the McDonald report.

So there is no reason why we have to wait for his report to put through the proposed amendments. I hope that by Report stage, the noble Lord Minister will be able to signal his acceptance of these amendments because we will keep pressing them. I'm sure the government will want to play its part in trying to dial down the anti-Israel and consequently anti-Semitic febrile activities and mood. In my opinion, it's most unfortunate the government chose to recognise the State of Palestine when it did.

This risked giving the organisations of protests the message that they're aggressive and unpleasant actions were being rewarded. The government now has an opportunity to try and show some evenhandedness. I beg to move.
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Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames Portrait Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (Liberal Democrat)
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My Lords, I share the concern that's been expressed by the noble Lord Lord Leigh of Hurley that senior police officers do not always act as they should, and I've expressed that concern in these proceedings on Tuesday in particular, to be rather rebuffed by the noble Lord Minister. And it is not, as I completely assure the noble Lord Lord Hogan-Howe, that I do not believe that generally police officers or senior police officers in particular, can be relied upon to act in the best interests of their community.

But I do urge the government to beware of legislating in the confident expectation that they always will. So I think Lord Lee's reservations are justified as the noble Lord, Lord Lord Leigh of Hurley explained. Clause one two four. As unamended permits a senior police officer to impose restrictions where processions or protests are in the vicinity of a place of worship, and may intimidate reasonable persons of reasonable firmness and deter them and do deter them from attending a place of worship for the purpose of carrying out religious activities, or from actually carrying out such activities.

And as Lord Lee wood has explained, the amendments would add faith schools or faith community centres to the institutions where conditions might be imposed. My Lords, we went on Tuesday through considerable argument about the purposes of clause one, two, four, and there was a great deal of discussion about protecting synagogues on successive Saturdays. And I do believe that Lord Hogan-Howe has raised an important point that communities gather together and worship or carry out religious activities, religious celebrations in areas quite apart from synagogues.

After all, Bondi Beach is not a synagogue. It's a public beach where Hanukkah celebrations had been organised and were being attended by Jewish communities. And I add my voice to Lord Hogan-Howe and to Lord Leigh of Hurley that our faith communities need protecting wherever they are gathering for the purposes of their faith. But with that said, I certainly agree, as does the noble Lord Lord Hogan-Howe with the extension of this power to cover religious activities at faith schools or faith community centres, that would be a proportionate protection and well defined.

And I make the point that faith schools are of particular sensitivity because they include they are for principally young people of given faith who may be damaged psychologically for life by being attacked in or in the vicinity of those schools. And the same goes for Faith centre, faith community centres, where Sunday school activities or religious education may be taken place. This is, of course, of particular importance to the Jewish community in the present climate. In the light of the horrific attacks that there have been about, which we've heard a great deal.

But it's also very important that Muslim faith schools and community centres should be protected as well, in the presence of considerable xenophobia and Islamophobia. My Lords, we need these protections. We need to combat the fear that is now beginning to permeate the whole of our national life, and has a really unpleasant and damaging effect and destroys community cohesion, national spirit, and the tolerance for which this country has long been famous.
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Lord Cameron of Lochiel Portrait Lord Cameron of Lochiel (Conservative)
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My Lords, the amendments in this group, tabled by my noble friend Lord Lee of Hurley and spoken to him so powerfully today, address an important gap in the bill as currently drafted. They ensure that faith schools and community centres are included within the definition of religious sites for the purpose of restrictions on protests. These amendments, at their core, are about protecting the ability of people to practice their faith freely and without intimidation. Places of worship are more than simply buildings used for ceremonial services.

They are frequently part of a wider religious campus that often includes schools, halls, and community sites. And it is wrong, even if inadvertent, to draw an artificial distinction between a synagogue, a church, or a temple and their adjoining faith school or community centre. Clause one two, four itself. And these amendments do not seek to ban protests, nor do they diminish the right to peaceful assembly. Instead, they allow the police to impose proportionate conditions where protests in the vicinity of a religious site may intimidate people, the reasonable firmness and deter them from accessing or carrying out religious activities.

And we had a long and vigorous debate on Tuesday on on the clause itself. It is, of course, as many said on Tuesday, crucial that the test is rooted in reasonableness and necessity, and is not used as a guide for police forces to stifle people's free speech and right to protest. But that self-evidently must be counterbalanced against people's safety, and particularly that of children, which is where these these amendments are so apposite. This is particularly important given the heinous terrorist attack that took place at Heaton Park Synagogue, and the aftermath of that attack saw armed police being required to stand guard at Jewish schools and community centres, and that this had to happen should shame us all in a civilised country.

Of course, no one should have to live in such fear. Not only that, in recent years there has been a troubling rise in protests which target religious communities in ways that stray well from robust political expression into sheer intimidation and faith. Schools and community centres are, of course, where children and families in particular gather, who should never be subject to threatening activity simply due to their faith. They're often places of education, as we've heard from noble Lord Lord Marks.

They're places of leisure, they're places of play, all in a religious setting. So with that said, in my submission that these amendments, in the name of my noble friend, are a welcome step, and I hope the noble Lord, the Minister, plays them very close regard and look forward to hearing his response. forward to hearing his response.
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Lord Katz Portrait Lord Katz (Labour)
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My Lords, I'm grateful for all who have contributed. important debate on the amendments that have been tabled in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Leigh of Hurley, and which seek to extend the power for police to restrict protests near places of worship to the faith schools and faith community centres and us, and was, as I said, tabled by noble Lord Lord Leigh of Hurley and supported by noble Lord Hogan-howe and Lord Massey of Hampstead, and also my, my, my, the opposition frontbench by Lord Cameron.

My Lords, I acknowledge the problem that the wider problem, society problem that Lord Leigh of Hurley very powerfully described in in moving the amendment and indeed I think it's fair to say he acknowledged the hence the hence the need for clause one, two, four and the inclusion of clause one, two, four in the Bill. We are, as government, very aware of the problem and indeed in the discussion that we had around the previous mega group on public order in on on Tuesday evening, there was there was some assertions by some noble Lords speaking that synagogues aren't impacted by marches or protests, and I'm neglected at that point in time.

But this is an opportunity for me to for me to say from the Dispatch Box, that's absolutely, very clear. That's absolutely not the case. And we know very directly that there are synagogues in central London that have been directly impacted by marches, have had to change their service times, have had their normal pattern of worship disrupted by these marches. And and it's very clear proof that in respect of the Jewish community over the last couple of years, at least, at least that's why we need the provisions of clause one, two, four.

However, I would add, before I move on to the actual amendment, I would just say I hope. I do hope the noble Lord, Lord Lee, when he in discussing in responding to those who raised with him in, in Israel and in the US, whether whether it's safe for Jews to live in Britain, to be in Britain, I do hope he provided them reassurance that this is still one of the best places to be be Jewish. We have fantastic values of tolerance and and a liberal approach to enjoying any and any lifestyle that you wish to, any religion that you that you wish to follow.

And I certainly as a British Jew, I'm very happy still, despite the concerns that we are discussing, to say that Britain is a great place to be a Jewish person. And I hope that that is that he responded in a similar manner to to the amendments. My Lords, currently under sections 12 and 14 of the Public Order Act 1986, the police must have a reasonable belief that a public procession or assembly may result in serious public disorder, serious damage to property, serious disruption to the life of the community or the purpose of those organising the protest is is the intimidation of others.

The police must have a similar reasonable belief under section one Fauziah in respect of noise generated by a one person protest. Clause one two, four My Lords will strengthen the police's ability to manage intimidatory protests near places of worship by allowing them to impose conditions on a public procession, public assembly or one person protests, specifically if they have a reasonable belief that the protest may result in intimidation and deter those seeking to access places of worship for the purpose of carrying out religious activities or conducting religious activities there.

My Lords, clause one, two, four does not define places of worship, which means that where community centres may be used as a place of worship, there is flexibility for the police to consider using this measure and imposing conditions if appropriate, and this is a proportionate approach, we believe, because it allows the police to exercise their independent operational judgement, rather than being constrained by prescriptive lists in legislation. Non-statutory guidance from the College of Policing will assist in clarifying marginal cases without removing the police's discretion.

I do appreciate that the point that the noble Lord of Lord Leigh of Hurley has made, and indeed has made in previous in previous debates on this around the issues of police discretion and response to him directly. I am, of course, very happy to meet with him and also with department officials to discuss this. And as we move through committee and before we get to it, before we get to report. So that offer is open to him and indeed other noble Lords would like to like, care to discuss, discuss the issue with regard to faith schools.

And, you know, as as the noble Lord Lord Marks said, there is particular sensitivity around schools because of course it involves young people. I declare interest. I have to to to daughters who are who attend a Jewish faith school. And it's incredibly concerning that they could be exposed to the manner of going to school very, you know, the most normal everyday activity that a that a that a child or young person undertakes can be so disrupted. So we are we are absolutely we share very much his his concern and also his concern that it isn't simply about Jewish faith schools.

We're talking about talking about all sorts of faith, all faith schools, particularly as he as the noble Lord Lord Marks pointed out, Muslim Muslim schools, they are they're very much it can be. It can be at the, at the, the edge, the cutting edge, to use that phrase of, of a very visible part place in a particular community where process can be, could be mounted, that can be kind of focus for local community opposition or aggression. And this is why we need to be careful about it.

But I would say the police, crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 gave local authorities the power to make expedited public space protection orders, which protect those attending schools from intimidation, harassment or impeded access in the course of a protest or demonstration. Combined with a wide range of powers, the police already have to address intimidation and harassment. These amendments would. I would submit that your Lordships' House unnecessarily duplicate existing law. Given that I hope, well, I hope I probably am realistic, but I would like to think I might have been able to reassure the noble Lord, Lord, Lord Lee little, and taking an account of the of the offer of a meeting and further discussion on on on the points that his amendments raised.

I hope he was thinking that agreed that his amendments are not necessary, or at least for the time being, he'd withdraw them.
13:07
Lord Leigh of Hurley Portrait Lord Leigh of Hurley (Conservative)
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Can I thank Lord Hogan-Howe for his his contribution? I was tempted to add restaurants, but I'd put the amendment in too early. But I did actually, instead of that, just made a booking there for members of House of Lords to join me. Be most welcome to support the restaurant and can I thank my riparian nature, and can I thank my riparian nature, my riparian neighbour down the river at Henley on Thames from Hurley for his most welcome contribution. And of course, my noble friend Lord Massey and the Shadow Minister in response to Lord Katz, I assure him that I told everyone who made that comment to me that the UK was a very safe space for Israeli citizens to come and visit, but it really was a concern that was expressed to me quite shockingly.

But I assure him I am totally in agreement with him on that. I would argue that community centres really could not be defined as places of worship, and specifically the Jw3 Centre, as he knows, could not be described as a place of worship, so would not come within that definition. But I can see that he's sympathetic and understanding, and I'm very grateful to that. And I'm grateful to the government for putting in section one, two, four. It clearly the 22 act was not sufficient, which is why they've had to put in the section one, two, four.

So perhaps there's a discussion to be had. I'm grateful for his agreement

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to do that. And on that basis I withdraw my amendment. Is it your Lordship's pleasure this amendment be withdrawn? It is by leave withdrawn. Amendment 371 B by leave withdrawn. Amendment 371 B Baroness Blower already debated, not moved. Amendment 371 B Lord not moved. Amendment 371 B Lord Leigh of Hurley not not moved. Leigh of Hurley not not moved. Amendment 371 c Baroness Blower already debated, not moved. Amendment 371. C a Lord Leigh of Hurley not moved.

Amendment 371 d already debated. Baroness Blower not moved. Amendment 371 DSIT Lord Leigh of Hurley not moved. Amendment 371 E already debated. Baroness Blower already not moved. Amendment 371 E Lord Leigh of Hurley not moved. Amendment 371 F already debated. Baroness Blower not moved. Amendment 371 G Lord Leigh of Hurley not moved. The question is that clause one two, four stand part of the bill, as many of that opinion say. Content the contrary not content.

The contents have it. Amendment 372 Lord Lord Hanson of of Flint moved formerly. Amendment 373 as an amendment to amendment 372 Lord Davies of Gower not moved. Amendment 374 as an amendment to amendment 372. Lord Davis, Lord Davies of Gower not moved. Amendment 375 is an amendment to amendment 372. Lord Davis not moved. Amendment 376 as an amendment to amendment 372, Lord Davis not moved. Amendment three, amendment 377 as an amendment to 372, Lord Davis not moved.

Amendment 378 is an amendment to amendment 372. Lord Davis not moved few. So the question is that amendment 372 stand part of the bill, as many of that opinion say. Content the contrary not content. The contents have it. Amendment 378 A Lord Walney not moved. Amendment 378B Lord Blencathra not moved. In clause 125. Amendment 379 Baroness Doocey.
13:11
Baroness Doocey Portrait Baroness Doocey (Liberal Democrat)
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My Lords, I rise to move. Amendments three seven, nine and to speak to amendment 471. When used responsibly, live facial recognition can help to protect the public. But the real question before us is not whether it's used, but how under what safeguards, with what scrutiny and by what authority from Parliament. At present, that answer is deeply unsatisfactory. Police forces are rolling out live facial recognition at speed without a clear legal framework, consistent oversight or meaningful public consultation, its operational use has more than doubled in a year.

Millions of pounds are being spent on new systems and mobile vans, yet there is still no reference to facial recognition in any Act of Parliament. Instead, the police rely on a patchwork of data protection law, the Human Rights Act and non-binding guidance. Parliament must now act urgently, urgently to put its use on a clear statutory footing. The police themselves say this is vital to maintain public trust. Recent Home Office testing of the police national database, retrospective facial recognition tool found significantly higher error rates for black and Asian people than white people.

For black women, the false positive rate was almost 1 in 10 when the system was run on lower settings. It also performs less reliably with children and young people, and the human consequences are already here. Schoolchildren in uniform wrongly flagged and told to prove their identity. A black Anti-knife campaigner stopped on his way home from volunteering and asked for his fingerprints because the system got it wrong. These are not theoretical risks. They are happening now. When this became public, Ministers ordered a review and testing of a new algorithm, which is welcome.

But questions remain. Why was the bias not disclosed earlier? Why on earth was the regulator not informed, and why a biased algorithm still in use today? A false match rate of nearly 1 in 10 for black women is not a technical glitch. It's a civil rights issue, running thousands of searches every month before strengthening statutory oversight only deepens public mistrust. That's why the measures in amendment 471 deserve very serious consideration. Amendment 379 is modest and practical.

It focuses on one of the most sensitive uses of live facial recognition, protests and public assemblies. It would require the police to pause its use at such events until a new statutory code of practice approved by Parliament is in place. That code would set out clearly when surveillance is justified, how watch lists are compiled, what safeguards apply and, crucially, what redress is available when things go wrong. This committee has already heard concerns about the gradual narrowing of protest rights.

Each new restriction may seem small in isolation, but together they add up elsewhere in the bill. As we heard last week. No, it was Monday. This week. The government seek to criminalise those who wish to remain anonymous at protests, combined with expanding facial recognition that places even greater pressure on protest rights. Taken together, these measures risk discouraging peaceful dissent and undermining freedom of expression. For many, attending a protest is an act of conscience, a private decision.

Some fear repercussions at work, others because of nationality, community or religion, may find their presence politically sensitive. They should not have to justify why they were there. Yet if turning up to a lawful demonstration means your face may be scanned by a system you cannot see and cannot challenge, some people will simply stay away. And those whose voices most need to be heard may be silenced. First. My Lord, these amendments do not oppose technology. I love technology, but they insist on accountability.

They set democratic safeguards before powerful surveillance tools are normalised, and they ensure that Parliament, and not algorithms, decide where

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the limits lie. I beg to move. Amendment proposed clause 125,

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Amendment proposed clause 125, page 152. Line 37. At the end, insert the words as printed on the Marshalled List.

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My Lords. I rise to oppose amendment 379

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I rise to oppose amendment 379 and support most of 471. Inadequate though it is, my views may not be the same as my noble friends on the the same as my noble friends on the frontbench. Of course, we all value the right to protest, but rights are not a shield for criminality. The government and policing Ministers have been very clear. Live facial recognition is being
13:17
Lord Blencathra Portrait Lord Blencathra (Conservative)
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developed and deployed as a targeted, intelligence led tool to identify known or wanted individuals on criminals on watch lists. It is not a blanket surveillance tool of the public. surveillance tool of the public. The Home Office has opened a consultation and asked for stronger statutory rules and oversight statutory rules and oversight precisely to ensure proportionate, lawful use. Amendment 379 would, in lawful use. Amendment 379 would, in effect, tie the hands of senior officers at the very moment when targeted identification can prevent or stop serious crime.

If a protest contains people who are wanted for violent offences, sexual offences or other serious crimes, the ability to identify them quickly and safely is not an abstract technicality. It's how we protect victims and uphold the rule of law. To see that demonstrations are somehow sacrosanct and must be free from tools that help catch criminals is to place form above substance. That is, not to dismiss legitimate concerns about privacy and bias. We should legislate a clear statutory framework, independent oversight and robust safeguards.

And I believe the government is consulting well, I know the government is consulting on exactly that path. I will want to see strong action to correct mistakes and address suggestions that it can't tell the difference in some ethnic groups. That has to be remedied if that allegation is true. But the right response is to legislate proportionate limits and accountability, not to pre-emptively ban a narrowly targeted operational capability at protests, and thereby letting risk and thereby risk letting wanted suspects slip away.

So for those reasons, I urge the House to reject amendment 379 and instead press the government to bring forward the statutory code and independent oversight the public rightly expects. Now, turning to amendment 471. That's a different kettle of fish and possibly off fish as well. The amendment is far too liberal and fails to protect the public from out of control public authorities. Now let me explain why, as a person relieved from ministerial duties in 1997, I found myself as a rather bored backbencher on the regulation of investigating investigation of investment on the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act of 19 of the year 2000, the famous Ripa.

Now the Minister, I think was Alan Michael at the time was waxing lyrical about how it would tackle serious crime, terrorism and paedophiles and mentioned how it would help the police, National Crime Agency or whatever it was called. Then MI5 and MI6 and HMRC and a couple of other big national government departments. We were all in agreement that that was a jolly good thing for these agencies to have that power. Then something the Minister said prompted me to table a question on what other public bodies could use Ripa powers, and we were shocked to discover that it was actually 32, including at that time something called the Egg Inspectorate of of MAFF, which were responsible for enforcing the little lion mark on eggs.

And now the schedule. One of the public authorities with phone tapping powers has expanded a bit since those days, and it now numbers 79. However, that is not the correct number because one of the 79 entries says every local authority. So you can add another 317 principal local authorities to that list. I think that every government department covers all the agencies and arms length. Bodies under its command also have access to Ripa now. In other words, my Lords, a worthy proposal to let some key government agencies have power to snoop on our mobile phones to detect serious crime or terrorism or paedophilia, has now become available to some extent to hundreds, possibly thousands of public bodies.

Now, the relevance of this, my Lords, is that if we agree that facial recognition technology can be extended beyond the police, immigration, National Crime Agency, the security services and possibly a few other big government departments who are concerned with organised crime, people trafficking and immigration, then I believe our civil liberties will be at stake if local authorities and some others get to use it as well. If local authorities get the power of facial recognition, then I'm certain they will abuse it.

A Scottish council uses Ripa to monitor dog barking. Allerdale District Council next to me in Cumbria, uses it to catch someone feeding pigeons. Of course it will be brilliant in my opinion to catch all those carrying out anti-social behaviour like riding dangerously on the pavement with their bikes, are not picking up dog nests or generally causing a disturbance. But my Lords, that's why I think this amendment does not go far enough. We don't need codes of practice and safeguards. We need a complete ban on all other public authorities using it until it has been tried and tested by the police, and we are satisfied that it does not cause false positive positives and is operationally secure.

And then if it is ever extended to other public authorities, it must be solely a subsection A says quote. It is used for the purpose of preventing, detecting or investigating serious crimes as defined under the Serious Crimes Act of 2007, unquote. If we do not have these protections, then they will end up. Local council will end up checking our recycling, what library books we take out, what shops and pubs we use and will justify by saying it will help them deliver a better spatial strategy, or design services to local to user patterns.

So, my Lords, I look forward to the liberals going back to their original roots as real liberals and bringing forward a better amendment which will protect our liberties.
13:22
Lord Strasburger Portrait Lord Strasburger (Liberal Democrat)
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My Lords, I rise to support amendment 379, to which I've added my name at a very strongly support my name at a very strongly support it. But before I do, I hope the Committee will forgive me if I digress very briefly to tidy up a digress very briefly to tidy up a matter which arose in committee last Tuesday, where I made the point that the police have the duty to facilitate protests rather than prevent it. And the Lord Hogan-Howe intervened to ask me where he might find a justification for that statement.

Well, I have good news. I have here the National Police Chief Council's protest operational advice document. And on page ten, under the heading role of the police, it says authorised Professional practice identifies two duties associated with the policing of protests. Broadly, these require that the police must not prevent, hinder or restrict peaceful protests and in certain circumstances, take reasonable steps to protect those who want to exercise their rights peacefully. Taken together, these duties the first the duty.

The second, a positive one, are often described as an obligation to facilitate the exercise of freedoms of assembly and expression. And on the back here I have a very handy flowchart which is entitled Facilitating Peaceful Protest, and I will make that available to the noble Lord. Following this debate. Returning to this group, my Lords, it's now eight years since the South Wales Police started deploying early versions of live facial recognition technology. When they did so, the technology was extremely inaccurate and there was absolutely no legislation in place to regulate or oversee the use of this mass surveillance technology.

And that is what it is for those noble Lords who haven't had the opportunity to experience facial recognition technology. I will give a quick overview of how it's used. It currently involves a large van full of electronics being parked in a location, such as a busy shopping street, where large numbers of ordinary people will walk past going about their daily business. On the top of the van are cameras pointing in all directions. They're scanning and recording the faces of all the passers by.

The technology tries to match them to a pre-prepared watch list, which is a set of images of people that the police want to find. For some reason, throughout the many hours of the deployment, something like 20 police officers will be standing around chatting and waiting for the system to decide, rightly or wrongly, that somebody whose face matches a person on the watch list has just walked past several of the otherwise unoccupied police officers, then detained the target and tried to determine whether it's a true match or not.

Big Brother Watch, which I chair, has observed many deployments of facial recognition by the Metropolitan Police and has seen many false matches happen, as well as false positives. The system is also susceptible to false negatives, where it fails to recognise somebody who is on the watch list, and anyone who the police would like to speak to but was not put on the watch list, can wander by undetected. The house can form its own view on whether this is a productive use of scarce police time and money.

But one thing is clear this is a highly intrusive mass surveillance of thousands of citizens, almost all of whom are completely innocent and should be of no interest to the police. My Lords, the UK already has one of the highest densities of CCTV cameras in the world. Facial recognition technology will in time be added to those fixed cameras in public spaces. The police or your local authority or supermarkets or whoever, will be able to keep tabs on who you are and what you're doing.

This technology is far more intrusive than fingerprints or DNA. Live facial recognition can capture your face and your location from a distance without you having any idea it has happened. It's as if you have a barcode on your forehead that can be read without your knowledge. My Lords, the collection and retention of fingerprints is tightly is tightly regulated by the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 and the Crime and Security Act 2010. Similarly, the use of DNA is strictly regulated by the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 and the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012.

But what regulation is there for the most intrusive technology of the lot? Facial recognition. Well, since the first deployment in 2017, absolutely no legislation, none at all has been introduced to control this serious threat to our privacy. The phrase, as we've already heard, the phrase facial recognition is not mentioned once in UK legislation. Police forces, including the met, have had a go at writing their own rules and marking their own homework, but that is obviously not their skill set and it's the job of legislators.

The police's homemade rules vary from force to force, and nobody is monitoring what is actually happening on the ground. For example, they assure us that all images that they collect that don't match someone on the match list are instantly and permanently destroyed to preserve the privacy of innocent passers by. But whether or not that always happens cannot be verified because there is no scrutiny as there would be with, for example, DNA. This serious legislative vacuum is not the fault of the police.

It is the fault of all the governments since 2017 who were asleep at the wheel and did nothing to control the use of this highly intrusive technology. You might ask, well, why does it matter to me? Why should I care if the state knows where I am and what I'm doing? I'm an honest, law abiding, clean living citizen. There's nothing in my life that I need to conceal from the police, or my boss or my spouse. You might be told by advocates of mass surveillance that if you have nothing to hide, then you have nothing to fear.

Well, my Lords, that claim is first attributed to the great Democrat Joseph Goebbels. The Chinese state where much of the technology for facial recognition comes from, uses it to monitor the behaviour of its citizens. It is used not just to keep track of where they are, but also to assess whether they're being good citizens in accordance with the state's definition of what a good citizen is. Now, my Lords, I do believe that this government, this Minister, I do not believe, I should say would.

I'll start again. I'll start again now, do I believe that this government, this Minister, would misuse the data from mass surveillance to persecute innocent citizens? Well, of course I do not. But can any noble Lord tell me who will be in ten Downing Street in ten years or three years? Trump is using the Justice Department to persecute his political opponents, whose only crime is to disagree with him. And Trump's biggest fan in this country is currently top of the opinion polls.

How foolish it would be to put into his hands a ready made tool for easily identifying all gay people, or Muslims or Jews, for whom he has showed a dislike at school. Of course, he could change the law and get his hands on the surveillance data anyway, but that would take time and would allow his targets to flee, as my father did from Nazi Germany. Now, my Lords, we cannot uninvent facial recognition technology, nor should we want to.

It's already here and we can't turn back the clock. But we can set legal limits on how it is used and what happens to the mass of data it collects about innocent citizens. That is what we have done for decades with fingerprints and DNA. At long last, just before Christmas, this government, to its credit, launched a consultation on facial recognition technology which might or might not lead to legislation sometime in the future. But in the meantime, amendment 379 puts a hold on using facial recognition technology for the mass surveillance of protesters until the essential statutory rules and oversight are in place.

For that reason, I commend it wholeheartedly to the House.
13:32
Lord Hogan-Howe Portrait Lord Hogan-Howe (Crossbench)
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Yes. disagree with Lord Strasburger in equal measure. Some may surprise him. In terms of the protest point. I think he reaffirmed what I tried I think he reaffirmed what I tried to say the other day, which is that the Echr doesn't give the term the Echr doesn't give the term facilitation of protest, but the police have given that term and put that sobriquet over the articles. And the danger is, and I'm afraid it's what materialised is, it's been interpreted as actually almost arranging some of the protests rather than the simplistic expression of facilitation.

So I don't think we're a mile apart on it, but I come at it from a slightly different angle in terms of facial recognition. I think it's an incredibly good thing, and I think people during the debate have agreed that it has got a value. It has two purposes. One is to retrospectively try and match a crime scene suspect with the obviously the database that the police hold of convicted people and the other one which has caused more concern, and which is where there may be common ground which is about live use of it.

One of the things that I think does need to be amplified, the Minister mentioned it when he responds, is that the Court of Appeal has decided that the police use of facial recognition is legal. Now. It did raise concerns that this is where I'm certainly agree with and I Baroness Symons would probably and Baroness Doocey has already made this point. It does need to treat all people equally. It's not OK to have a high failure rate against one group of by race, and a different success rate against another race.

That's that's not acceptable. And I was surprised. I know Baroness Jones was when this hadn't been made public and was discovered in whatever way it was discovered. So that does have to be got right. And there's no justification for that, that error rate. And it has to be resolved. But I think equally and the second thing, which is where certainly Baroness Jones might be surprised, I actually agree that there should be more regulation of its use and that that should be regulation by Parliament, not by the police.

Where I disagree is whether this act is the right way to do it and whether the amendment which is proposed is the right way either. I think we're all going to have to learn, first of all, how the technology works and how it's applied by the police, where its benefits are and where its risks are. And I also agree that there ought to be independent oversight of it, and that anybody who is offended by its use should have the opportunity to get someone to check into it and see whether or not it's been misused or not, and it should be provided with a remedy.

Now that a remedy may be compensation financially, I would argue it's probably better that, in fact, something happens to the database that makes it less likely to be ineffective in the future. But this needs some reassurance that somebody's, you know, improving this system rather than not. So I'm for facial recognition. I think there should be regulation. I don't think this is the act is the right time. And I think, as has already been said, that the consultation started just before Christmas, I think concluding in February will give us a good way forward, but it will need a bit more thought than I think.

This bill, and therefore this act might offer us. And I do finally think that there are an awful lot of regulators out there, and we're all paying for them. There are surveillance commissioners, there are intrusive surveillance commissioners. There are biometric commissioners. If they ever get together and actually have one commissioner to look at the lot, we'd probably save quite a lot of money because they're all examining the same area. And I think this is an area that the existing commissioners probably could do two things.

One, regulate and potentially approve in either retrospect or prospectively, depending on, you know, the emergency or the urgency which should be used. So I think there's some need for help. I don't think this bill for me is the right opportunity.
13:36
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Portrait Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (Green Party)
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It's I've signed. it's a very sensible amendment. And it it does cover some ground that it it does cover some ground that really does need tackling. It ensures the police cannot use live facial recognition technology when facial recognition technology when imposing conditions on public assemblies or processions under sections 12 or 14, unless a new specific code of practice governing its use in public spaces has first been formally approved by both Houses of Parliament. Now that sounds quite democratic, doesn't it? It is intended to safeguard public privacy and civil liberties by requiring democratic oversight.

Before this surveillance technology is deployed in such contexts. It's always interesting to hear the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-howe, former Met Commissioner, on the tiny little areas that we do overlap in agreement on. It's I think it's very healthy. However, I disagree deeply when he says this isn't the legislation, it should be something else. We keep hearing that. I cannot tell you how many times I and and Lady Ducie, for example, and Lord Strasburger have raised this issue here in Parliament and in other places.

And the noble Lord Lord Strasburger asked quite interesting question why should we care? And quite honestly, I care because I believe in justice and I believe in fairness, and I want that in society. I, as I pointed out yesterday, I'm a highly privileged white female. I have been arrested, but I was arrested almost immediately by the Met Police who who all the surrounding people started saying, do you know who she is? And they immediately took the handcuffs off. And I just think, I just think at some point we have to accept that this needs regulation.

We cannot accept that the police constantly mark their own homework. And especially now we were reassured that all the flaws in the algorithm and so on had been fixed. But clearly we can't be sure of that because we don't have any way of of knowing exactly what the flaws were and where you know who has fixed it. And quite honestly, live facial recognition represents a huge departure from long established principles of British policing in this country. People are not required to identify themselves to the police unless they are suspected of wrongdoing.

Live facial recognition turns that principle on its head by subjecting everyone in range of a camera to an automated identity check, it treats innocent members of the public as potential suspects and undermines the presumption of innocence. And I disagree deeply with the noble Lord Lord Blencathra, when he says it's not a blanket surveillance tool. Of course it is. It is a blanket surveillance tool and is highly dangerous at that point of view. It is a mass biometric surveillance tool.

It scans faces in real time, retains images of those flagged by the system, and does so without individual's knowledge or consent. If the police randomly stop people in the street to check their fingerprints, for example, against a database, we would rightly be alarmed. Live facial recognition performs the same function only invisibly and at scale. Its use in the context of protest is also a dangerous crossing of a constitutional line. We already have evidence that facial recognition has been deployed at demos and major public events, with chilling effect on lawful protest.

People will not go to these protests because they feel vulnerable. They are deterred from exercising their rights to freedom of expression and assembly because they fear being identified, tracked or wrongly stopped. While this amendment proposes a safeguard through parliamentary approval of a statutory code, we should not allow that to imply acceptance of live facial recognition at protests in principle. I mean, in my view, this technology has absolutely no place in the policing of democratic dissent. And we should also reflect on the broader direction of travel life.

Facial recognition is most enthusiastically embraced by authoritarian regimes. While a number of democratic countries have moved to restrict or prohibit its use. And that alone surely should give this government pause to reflect on whether or not this is the right legislation to bring in. Independent observers have witnessed cases in which live facial recognition has misidentified children in school uniform, leading to lengthy and very distressing police stops. In some instances, those wrongly flagged were young black children subjected to aggressive questioning and fingerprinting.

Despite having done nothing wrong. What safeguards are in place to prevent misidentification, particularly of children and people from UK minority ethnic communities? That is a basic question that we should be asking before we pass this legislation. So I support this amendment as an essential check, but I hope this debate sends a wider message that Parliament will not allow the routine use of intrusive biometric surveillance to become the price of exercising fundamental democratic rights. I just want to pick up something as well that the noble Lords Minister said yesterday, because he directed your Lordships' House to the front page of the bill and said that in his view, the bill was compliant with the EA.

But as the noble Lady Baroness Chakrabarti pointed out, that's his belief. That's his view. That is not that is absolutely not a certificate of accuracy. I'm not suggesting for one moment that there is any intent to deceive. I'm merely saying it is not a certificate of of truth, with claims about seemingly authoritarian laws being complied with human rights. That assessment can be challenged and should be challenged as much as possible. It still remains subjective and is challenged by justice, the organisation justice, for example, and we are clearly going to disagree about a lot in this bill.

But I would like to say we are trying to do our best over here to actually make the law fair and representative of justice that we think should exist here in Britain.
13:43
Lord Moynihan of Chelsea Portrait Lord Moynihan of Chelsea (Conservative)
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It is. >> My Lords. I was hesitant as to whether to speak here, but I, I did some years ago have a very close acquaintance with, with facial recognition software. And so I thought it might be useful to say a couple of things. First of all, couple of things. First of all, that I very much agree with the noble Lord Lord Hogan-Howe that this is an extremely good technology. I will get to the concerns expressed about it in a minute.

This software was used to apprehend murders. For example. I think the Australian outback murder murderer was apprehended because of it. A a far right group of extremists in Sweden were identified by some very clever use of this facial recognition technology. It can be used very successfully in preventing crime. Now, that is all. Not live use of the technology. And and these amendments are about live use of the technology. And I would just say to the noble Lord Strasburger I very much respect his work.

I'm a thought of as racist if they focussed on black faces, and therefore the accuracy on black faces was much worse, they discovered. And so they quickly started training the software on black faces. And the disparity closed right up. And as far as I know, the disparity, if it still exists, is quite small. I don't know, others may know better than me. This was several years ago, but that definitely happened with this set of facial recognition software. There is the issue of people being stopped and searched who are perfectly innocent.

Well, my Lords, I mean, that happened to me several times when I was in my teens and 20s. I had rather long hair and looked a bit shifty. Shifty. Shifty is a is a great is a great description. You could probably go far worse than that. No, but but but I you know, I was given a hard time and then let go and and we have to accept that there will be errors. But we have to understand where this is going.

We we can less and less afford to have police on the streets. You've you've seen that problem and technology has to take over and you have to look at a very successful crime fighting group in New York who was super spotters. They would go to an area where there was a lot of crime because, you know, you had that that process in New York where they directed people to the crime hotspots, and they were very good at looking at the gait of individuals to see whether they were carrying guns or carrying knives.

And soon people in that area discovered that they'd better not carry guns because they would be stopped by these super spotters and arrested for carrying a gun. And if you're not carrying a gun, which they'd all stopped doing, you can't kill somebody with a gun because you don't have a gun to kill them with. And that was a tremendously successful operation in terms of lowering crime and the state of the art in facial recognition. At least when I stopped looking at it a couple of years ago, was more in gait than it is in face.

And we have to understand that you can start training technology to be much more effective than even these super spotters in spotting people who are carrying using their gait to recognise an individual, not their face. And there are all sorts of ways in which this software will be used to recognise people, and it will get better and better, and there will be less and less mistakes made. But nonetheless, there will always be mistakes made. And that's the way of policing.

When they stop me, they were mistaken. I was this tremendously law abiding good chap. But nevertheless, you know, they stopped me and so will the facial recognition and I do. I loved the noble Lord Strasburger description of the 20 police hanging around because. Because I'm sure in this entire house resonated to noble Lords as to the sort of thing that happens. But over time we are going to have to depend on technology like this. We're going to have to be extremely careful about civil liberties, but we cannot just blanket get rid of this technology because it's going to be very

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important to policing in the future. I sought to intervene on the noble Lord, the Lord Strasburger, noble Lord, the Lord Strasburger, before he sat down, but the noble Lord Lord Hogan-Howe beat me to it. I wanted to ask him a simple I wanted to ask him a simple question, but first of all, could I say how sorry I am? We are on different sides on this because when we serve together on the when we serve together on the Snooper's charter bill, we were totally united.

That was a bad bill. We worked hand in glove to amend it. We worked hand in glove to amend it. My question is this can he tell me the substantive difference between a camera and a computer? Watching everyone in the crowd and picking out the wanted troublemakers and those 20 policemen? He talked about looking at everybody in the crowd and picking out the the wanted troublemakers from their briefing or from their memory. What's the real difference between it?

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When I went and observed these deployments of facial recognition, and I looked at the 20 policemen and I looked at the 20 policemen standing around, it occurred to me that they probably find a lot more of the people they were looking for. of the people they were looking for. If they just went round to their house and knocked on the door, rather than worked on the off rather than worked on the off chance they might walk past them in the high street.



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the high street. My Lords, can I thank my noble friend Baroness Doocey? I think she's elicited, as was the intention, a very useful debate this morning, and I particularly welcome some of the comments made by the noble Lord Hogan-howe. But I
13:49
Lord Clement-Jones Portrait Lord Clement-Jones (Liberal Democrat)
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would say to him that a bill with the title Crime and Policing might possibly be the place for possibly be the place for discussion of the use of live facial recognition in policing, my Lord. So maybe we can make some progress in terms of hoping that the government is going to respond, at least giving an indication ahead of its consultation what its of its consultation what its approach to the legislative framework around live facial recognition is. My Lords, and I very much hope that the government will be taking on board this debate as part of its consultation.

My Lords, as my noble friend Baroness Doocey has very clearly stated, My Lords, these amendments are necessary because live facial recognition currently operates in effectively a legislative void. Yet the police are rolling out this technology at speed. And my Lords, there is no explicit Act of Parliament authorising its deployment, meaning police forces are effectively. My noble friend, Lord Strasburger indicated, are effectively writing their own rules as they go. This technology represents a fundamental shift in the relationship between citizen and state.

When LFR cameras are deployed, our public spaces become biometric checkpoints effectively, where every face is indiscriminately scanned. By treating every citizen as a suspect in a permanent digital line up, we are abandoning the presumption of innocence. And I thought the noble Baroness Jones made that point. Very well. My Lords, there is a clear issue as a result of public trust. Amendment 379 prohibits the use, would prohibit the use of LFR during public assemblies or processions, unless a specific code of practice has been formally approved by resolution of both Houses of Parliament.

My Lords, this is essential to protect our freedoms of expression and assembly under articles ten and 11 of the Echr. The pervasive tracking capability of LFR creates what the courts have recognised as a chilling effect, described by my noble friend Baroness Doocey and by the noble Baroness Jones. Law abiding citizens are discouraged from attending protests or expressing dissenting views for fear of permanent state monitoring, and we know that police forces have already used this technology to target peaceful protesters who were not wanted for any crime.

People should not have to hand over their sensitive biometric data as the price of engaging in democratic processes and without explicit parliamentary consent and approved code of practice, we are sleepwalking into a surveillance state that bypasses democratic oversight entirely. Amendment 471 establishes that LFR use in public spaces must be limited to narrowly defined serious cases, such as preventing major crimes or locating missing persons, and requires prior judicial authorisation, specifying the scope and purpose of each deployment and the need for this oversight was made absolutely clear by the 2020 Court of Appeal ruling.

In our bridges versus Chief Constable of South Wales Police, which found LFR use unlawful due to fundamental deficiencies in the legal framework. The court identified that far too much discretion is left to individual officers regarding who ends up on a watch list and where cameras are placed. We must replace operational discretion with judicial scrutiny, and the government itself now acknowledges the inadequacy of the current framework, which it describes as a patchwork. Framework. And they say it is complicated and difficult to understand.

Well, my Lords, that is at least some progress towards government acknowledging of the situation. And they say that the current framework does not provide sufficient confidence for expanded use here, here, my Lords, the former biometrics and Surveillance camera commissioner made clear his concerns about the College of Policing guidance, questioning whether these fundamental issues require more than an authorised professional practice document from the College of Policing and instead demands parliamentary debate. The former commissioner raised a profound question is the status of the UK citizen shifting from our jealously guarded presumption of innocence to that of being, quote, suspected until we have proved our identity to the satisfaction of the examining officer.

Such a fundamental shift in the relationship between citizen and state cannot be determined by guidance, and should not be determined by guidance alone. My Lords, the College of Policing's app on LFR, while attempting to provide operational guidance, falls short of providing the robust legal framework that this technology demands. It remains non-statutory guidance that can be revised without parliamentary scrutiny, lacks enforceable standards for deployment decisions, provides insufficient detail on bias testing and mitigation requirements, and does not establish independent oversight mechanisms with real teeth.

Most critically, the guidance permits watchlist compilation based on subjective assessments without clear statutory criteria or independent review, and this leaves fundamental decisions about who gets surveilled to operational discretion rather than judicial oversight. And, you know, I may say to the noble Lord Blencathra, who I think was keen on one bit of our amendment, but not the other, and that this intelligence led tool, my Lords, effectively delegates it to a senior police officer. And my Lords, they in a sense, have a conflict of interest.

They are the ones who make the operational decision, my

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Lords. noble Lord, for giving way. I was going to intervene in any case was going to intervene in any case to say that it seems that he and his noble friends keep talking about the police and the power and the restrictions which should be the restrictions which should be posed on the police. But amendment 471 seems to extend facial recognition to hundreds and recognition to hundreds and hundreds of public authorities, provided they adhere to a code or comply with certain practice. Does comply with certain practice.

Does he still stand by the idea that facial recognition should be extended to hundreds of public

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authorities, in addition to the police? My Lords, I think if he accepts

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My Lords, I think if he accepts the fact that controls are required, which he didn't in his earlier comments, then I think he would be comments, then I think he would be greatly reassured if you had to have judicial oversight of the use of live facial recognition, which of live facial recognition, which is useful in circumstances other than purely policing. My Lords, than purely policing. My Lords, what we are talking about here are a greater level of control over the deployment of live facial recognition, my Lords, and we can argue perfectly satisfactorily about whether or not it should be extended beyond the police.

But, my Lords, we are suggesting that alongside that greater deployment or possible greater deployment, there should be a much greater degree of oversight, which I think effectively answers the noble Lord. In that respect, my Lords, the Metropolitan Police's own data from recent LFR operations shows a false alert rate requiring officers to make numerous stops of innocent people, even with claimed accuracy improvements. When a system processes thousands of faces, even a small error translates to significant numbers of misidentifications affecting law abiding citizens.

And more concerning is the evidence on differential performance. And that's where I fundamentally agreed with the noble Lord Hogan-Howe that National Physical Laboratories 2020 testing of facial recognition systems found significant variation in performance across demographic groups. And while contemporary LFR systems used by UK police show better performance than earlier algorithms, independent research continues to identify measurable differences in accuracy rates across ethnicity and gender. My Lords, the Court of Appeal in Brydges ruled that South Wales Police breached the public sector equality duty by failing to satisfy themselves that the software was free from gender or bias.

Yet current deployment practices suggest insufficient progress in addressing these equality obligations, and we should also address the secrecy surrounding police watch lists. The Justice and Home Affairs Committee of this House recommended that these lists be subject to compulsory statutory criteria and standardised training. My Lords, there is no independent review of watchlist inclusion, no notification to those placed on lists and no clear route for challenge or removal. My Lords, my Lords are very much appreciate it. Also, what the Lord Moynihan have to say about the problems with software.

But my Lords, the chilling sentence that he delivered was technology has to take over. I think that is precisely the problem that we are living with. My Lords, if technology is to take over, we need a legal framework to govern it. My Lords, the current patchwork of overlapping laws addressing human rights, data protection and criminal justice is not fit for purpose. My Lords, these amendments provide the democratic and judicial guardrails needed to contain this technology, and we cannot allow the convenience of new tools to erode our established civil liberties.

Only Parliament should determine the framework for how LFR is used in our society, and only the courts

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should authorise its deployment in individual cases. Here for Lord Clement-Jones sits down. If you just address one issue which none of us have addressed yet, which obviously this is particularly concerned about the particularly concerned about the state use of facial recognition for all the reasons that we've talked about. But actually the private about. But actually the private sector, far in advance of this, 12, 13 years ago, they were using that as a product called Face Watch, as a product called Face Watch, which was started at Gordon's Wine Bar because he was sick of people walking into the bar, either violently assaulting his patrons, having returned, or alternatively, stealing things.

So he put a clever camera on the door and he didn't get into the bar. If you'd been accused of that in the past, and that product is now moved right around the world, it's certainly extensively used in the UK in different settings, and I'm not arguing that that's good or bad. I just merely observe that if we end up in a position where the police have less availability of what can be a good technology, and private commerce is getting benefits, which presumably they're able to justify, then that inequality of arms doesn't benefit anyone.

And I think at least it should be considered in the consultation that the government started, which is particularly focussed on the police. But it's not only the police we have to consider, I believe, whether it be airports, railway

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stations, etc. Good point. Very briefly, my Lords. I don't

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Very briefly, my Lords. I don't think that the the noble Lord is making a bad case at all in that respect. This live facial recognition, whether in the hands of the public sector or the private sector, needs a proper legal framework. There's no doubt about that. My noble friend made it clear that we thought it was a useful technology. I don't think there's technology. I don't think there's any doubt about that, but the more useful it is, the more we need to make sure that it's under proper control.
14:01
Lord Cameron of Lochiel Portrait Lord Cameron of Lochiel (Conservative)
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My Lords, this group of >> My Lords, this group of amendments touches on how the police should deal with modern threats and how we balance civil liberties with the clear duty of the states to protect the public. the states to protect the public. Listen very carefully to the noble Baroness, Lady Doocey, when she introduced her amendment 379, which, as she said, would prevent the police from using live facial recognition when imposing conditions on public processions or assemblies under the relevant provisions of the Public Order Act, unless and until a new statutory code of practice have been approved.

If we accept, as we on these Benches believe we should, and I think, as others do, in in your Lordships' House, that live facial recognition can be a legitimate and valuable policing tool in preventing crime, in identifying suspects and in protecting the public, then it is our view on these benches that it is difficult to justify singling out its use in this specific context for an additional and likely onerous layer of bureaucracy. The police already operate within an extensive framework of legal safeguards, such as data protection law, and to require a further code of practice, subject to affirmative approval by both houses of Parliament.

In our view, risks delaying or deterring the deployment of technology precisely where it may be most needed. So, regretfully, we cannot support this amendment. Turning to amendment 47, one tabled by the noble Lord Lord Clement-Jones. This goes further in terms of the government's of affecting the government's ability to use live facial recognition technology. It would restrict the circumstances in which live facial recognition could be used. It would require prior judicial authorisation in the specific circumstance of circumstances of its use, and it would create an extensive new enforcement and oversight architecture, public order situations are often fast moving and unpredictable.

Senior officers must be able to make operational decisions quickly based on risk and intelligence on the ground, and introducing additional procedural hurdles at the point of use risks undermining that agility. We should be focussed on rolling out effective technology at pace to combat crime and disorder, while ensuring robust safeguards and scrutiny. In particular, the requirement for prior judicial authorisation is, in our view, particularly problematic. One of the principal advantages of live facial recognition is its speed and its flexibility.

It can be deployed rapidly in response to emerging intelligence, acute threats or serious risks to public safety, and requiring prior judicial approval risks rendering the technology ineffective in precisely the circumstances where it could prevent serious harm. In dynamic operational scenarios such as events, violent disorder, knife crime, hotspots, or rapidly evolving threats, delay can mean failure. And I was particularly taken by the speech of my noble friend Lord Moynihan, who spoke about the position in America in New York.

I think he said where there were, because of there being fewer police on the street, the technology had to take over. And I think he was right to say that we on these benches are concerned by the attempt to narrow the scope of live facial recognition to a defined, tightly defined set of purposes. Because if Parliament accepts the use of this technology in principle, it makes little sense to confine it to only a small number of scenarios. Crime does not present itself neatly within statutory categories, and policing requires judgement and discretion.

Artificially restricting the use of a tool that has demonstrated value risks, depriving the police of one of the most effective capabilities available to them. And we of course, recognise the needs for appropriate safeguards to be implemented in the use of this technology. This new and expanded use of people's data, even if to facilitate an objective that we support, must be enacted with transparency and proportionality. But, my Lords, these amendments would constrain the police's operations and weaken our ability to respond to modern threats.

And at a time when criminals are increasingly sophisticated and technologically adept, Parliament should be empowering the police to use lawful, proportionate and effective tools rather than tying their hands.
14:07
Lord Hanson of Flint Portrait Lord Hanson of Flint, The Minister of State, Home Department (Labour)
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I'm grateful, my Lords, to the noble Lady Baroness Doocey, for noble Lady Baroness Doocey, for tabling the amendments and starting this important debate. I believe this important debate. I believe that facial recognition is an increasingly important tool that helps the police, and I'm grateful, I think, for the support of the noble Lord Blencathra, noble Lord Cameron of Lochiel, the noble Lord Hogan-howe. And I was particularly struck by the noble Lord Moynihan of Chelsea's comments as well on gait and movement.

And I think that they do point to why this is valuable. Currently, facial recognition technology is used to identify those suspected of committing crime. Those who may be in breach of a court order. As the noble Lord Clement-Jones said, those who are missing persons and could be found. And to put some context to it, for example, there were 127 people arrested following facial technology following the disturbances in summer of 2024 around asylum protests. And if I look at the figures for the Metropolitan Police between January 24th and September 25th, 1300 people were arrested for such offences as rape, robbery, GBH and 100 sex offenders in that period were arrested for breaching their conditions i.e.

going to an area where they shouldn't have gone. Now I think that's quite valuable action. I think that's a valuable tool. I think it's a valuable piece of resource, but that doesn't mean which goes to the heart of the amendment that the noble Baroness has raised, that the concerns of Lord Strasburger and Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb and the noble Lady herself and the Liberal Democrat frontbench are not ones that need to be examined. And noble Lords will be aware that currently the use of facial recognition technology is already subject to safeguards, including the Human Rights Act and Data Protection Act.

But the government accepts there is a need to consider whether there is a bespoke legislative framework is needed and we need to get it right. We need to balance the need to protect communities from crime and disorder, but we also need to safeguard individual rights. And as the noble Lady will know, and as has been referenced in this debate, on the 4th of December, the government launched a consultation for which I have a copy available to the House here today, which is a ten week consultation on a new framework for enforcement of the use of facial recognition and similar technologies.

The consultation explores when and how these technologies should be used, what safeguards are required to protect the issues that noble Lords and ladies have raised today, and to ensure that their use is proportionate to the seriousness of the harm being addressed by refer, if I may, the House to page five of the consultation in the summary, which says, and I quote. The government is therefore committed to developing and introducing a new legal framework that sets out rules for the overt use of facial recognition by law enforcement agencies.

That's a clear government objective, and the consultation is about how we achieve that government objective. It runs to the 12th of February. I would encourage all those who've spoken to submit their views. I can take as well the, the, the amendment 47 one as a positive contribution to the consultation. There are some aspects of that which, you know, I think will cause difficulties, but it's a fair point to put to the committee today, and I hope that noble Lords will accept that.

I can't today pre-empt the outcome of the consultation because it runs to February the 12th. But the clear objective, as I've read out on page five of the consultation, is to find the framework that noble Lords are seeking. We will need legislation to put in place the new legal framework, and that will come when parliamentary time allows.

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Thank you, Minister, for accepting this intervention. He says he can't pre-empt the outcome says he can't pre-empt the outcome of the consultation. But surely clause one, two, whatever it is, clause one, two, whatever it is, one, two, one that amends clause one, two, one that amends clause one, two, five is being is already pre-empts the outcome of the

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consultation. I don't think it does. But we'll but we'll, we'll, we'll we'll we'll leave it at that. I don't think it does. There's a proper consultation. There's the full consultation document for which I'm sure a copy is available in the House for members to look at. But I still I still revert to my starting point that for the reasons that have been laid out by a number of members in the House today across the political divide and non, it is a valuable tool.

And you know, again I say to the the noble Lord and lady who raised this, have they an objection to automatic number plate recognition? Because if a vehicle stands at the side of the road, under current regulations, regulated every vehicle that goes past is inverted commas an innocent vehicle, but some of those number plates will lead to crime of being resolved or individuals being caught. So the principle is there. And if they object to the principle, then we're not going to find common ground on this.

We do need to have regulation. I've accepted that we're bringing forward the consultation, but ultimately, in my view, it is a valuable tool to help stop and prevent crime and to catch criminals.

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Lords Minister for making way. You cannot compare. You cannot You cannot compare. You cannot compare cars with people. I'm sorry. That's a completely false That's a completely false comparison. It's, you know, the camera. I don't know if the noble Lord has been in a in a van with a Lord has been in a in a van with a camera looking at number plates. There's no mistaking number plates. There's a lot of mistaking human There's a lot of mistaking human faces.

And while I'm on my feet, perhaps I could say the noble order earlier used the word proportionately. Now there is a significant distinction between proportionately and expediency, and the test for lawful interference with rights is proportionality rather than expediency. This is something we covered before, but it's come up again now, and therefore having expediency in the bill gives police the powers beyond what is reasonable for human rights. And we are not sitting here and spending hours into the night doing this for fun.

We can all agree this isn't fun. We are doing it because

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we believe the bill is wrong. I'm doing it because I believe we need to try to catch criminals we need to try to catch criminals and reduce crime. And that's a fair disagreement potentially between us. That's what I'm doing this bill for. No. Well, that's what this that's No. Well, that's what this that's what this bill is about. And the issue of facial recognition technology is an important technology is an important mechanism, in my view. And that's a disagreement. If we have one in a disagreement.

If we have one in a moment, in a moment to prevent crime and to reduce crime. Now I say to the noble Lady that there is the regulation that we've got and we've agreed to we're going to bring forward regulation. We're consulting about what that includes. I hope she will submit some views upon it. But I remain convinced that the type of technology that

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we've got is technology that is valid and useful. Thank you. Minister, for giving away. I

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Minister, for giving away. I don't normally disagree with the Minister. I mean, we might be on different sides of an argument, but different sides of an argument, but I really do find it very, very bad. That last comment. We are all on That last comment. We are all on the same side. We all want to catch criminals and prevent crime. And I do think that needs to go on the do think that needs to go on the record. From what you've just said, it was almost as though you were suggesting that you were on that side.

But we weren't. And just to make it clear, we are not sitting here for the sake of it. We are here because we genuinely believe in this. We want to catch criminals and prevent crime. OK.

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Well, let's, let's, let's let's put the hand of friendship out then. And let's make common cause on And let's make common cause on those issues. But, I mean, I say to the noble Lady in relation to her amendment today, I simply say to amendment today, I simply say to her that the consultation is there. Amendment 47 one goes quite a long Amendment 47 one goes quite a long way beyond even what the noble Lady Ducey has brought forward. But I do Ducey has brought forward.

But I do believe that that is a potential future crime fighting tool. It needs regulation around it. That's what the government's intending to do on page five of the consultation. We're very clear. That's what we're intending to do. How and what is regulated and how it's approached is what the consultation is about. But the basic principle of the noble Ladies Amendment is one that I agree with. And therefore I would ask you to withdraw it.
14:16
Baroness Doocey Portrait Baroness Doocey (Liberal Democrat)
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Like that in writing. My Lords, I thank the Minister for his I thank the Minister for his response, and all noble Lords who have taken part in this debate. The Minister mentioned the consultation, and I'm very pleased to hear that the government is going to legislate. I do hope Parliament legislate. I do hope Parliament will be very much involved in that because, like anything, the devil will be in the detail. So I think whatever comes out of it is very, very important.

Can you just tell me what happens if the public consultation, if people say in response to the consultation that they don't want the police to access particular databases, will the government then take those clauses out of the bill? Perhaps you could just clarify that. And I have a concern that even before the consultation began, the Home Office was saying it hoped the process would pave the way for wider rollout. I don't think that really inspires confidence if that Ministers are keeping an open mind, because a consultation shouldn't be used as a rubber stamp, it should be used as the start of a genuine national conversation about the limits that a free society wants to place on mass biometric data surveillance.

Yeah, for that conversation to mean anything, the public need to know the full picture, how accurate the systems are, where and when they're being used. And right now that transparency just isn't there. And if, as we've heard from the Home Office, any new laws informed by the consultation will take about two years to be passed by Parliament, unquote. That's far too slow, given the pace of technological change. And that comment was made in December 2025. All we're asking for is that Parliament sets the rules before the technology sets them for us.

And I do hope Parliament will be involved in setting those rules. But for now, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Yes. Mr. Lordships pleasure this amendment be withdrawn. The amendment is withdrawn. The question is that clause 125 stand part of the Bill, as many that opinion will say. Content to the contrary, not content. The contents have it amendment 380 has been withdrawn. The question is that clause 126 stand part of the bill. As manager of that opinion will say content to the contrary, not content.

The contents have it. Amendments 381 and 382 have been withdrawn. Amendments 380 2ZA Lord Walney not Amendments 380 2ZA Lord Walney not moved. Amendment 382 382 A, B, C, D and D Lord Davies of Gower not moved. Amendment 382 E Lord Walney not moved. After close 126 amendment 382 F Lord Moynihan of Chelsea.

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I Lords. The amendments in this and the next group set out to remove criminalisation of elements of so-called hate crime on grounds that include incoherence, ineffectiveness and divisiveness. ineffectiveness and divisiveness. Anyone proposing amendment of this sort risks being seen as favouring hate crime and hate speech, of hate crime and hate speech, of being careless or reckless about the real hurt that individuals at the receiving end of hate speech or hate crime might feel. The opposite is the case here.

I vigorously oppose racism and any other form of discrimination, but I believe that both the concept and the implementation of hate crime law is just is not just ineffective, but counterproductive. There are three types of hate crime law that I seek to amend in this and in the following amendment. First, direct criminalisation of certain offensive words. Second, an enhanced sentence when a crime is aggravated by directing certain offensive words towards individuals with certain protected characteristics.

And third, stirring up offences based on use of offensive words, behaviour or material so as to arouse hatred against an individual with certain protected characteristics. This my First Amendment abolishes the criminalisation of particular offensive words that are merely grossly offensive. While the amendment still leaves in place the sanctioning of any words that would cause or provoke actual or fear of violence in our national history. My Lords, hate crime law is new. We got along perfectly well without it for many centuries.

Until the 1965 Race Relations Act was passed to prevent race, violence and discrimination. We've now gone a long way further than that first law, with hate crime legislation embedded in a number of different acts covering both deeds and thoughts, going beyond race into a number of different protected characteristics. The most recent of these being transgender. Sometimes all that's needed for a conviction is if the victim, or indeed any person, takes offence, sometimes with no test of reasonableness. Many scene see this as having divided society into warring grievance groups.

These laws are not working. Unintended consequences. Role in hard cases. Make bad law criminalise one obviously appalling thing. And it's hard not by doing that to criminalise other not so appalling things. So Graham Linehan is arrested by five armed police at the airport. You get police incented to pursue soft targets for soft crimes. You get police encouraged into a Stasi mindset, telling ordinary citizens, I need to check your thinking. Have these laws created social cohesion? No. Anti-Semitism, for example, has suddenly become widespread in our country.

These laws are confusing. Late last year, the College of Policing issued guidance on female genital mutilation, stating trans women, which is to say men, whether holding a gender recognition certificate or not, are just as threatened by female genital mutilation as are women and girls. This, my Lords, was utterly absurd. But if you say it's wrong, you have to be prepared for possible investigation by well-meaning but improperly informed police. These laws are cluttering up the justice system. I think noble Lords understand this, but I will talk about it in greater detail when I get to my Second Amendment later.

These laws are onerous upon the innocent. It is difficult to exaggerate, my Lords, the devastating effect that an arrest and the subsequent multi-month legal process can have on a law abiding citizen, even when at the end of it they are exonerated, an overall hate narrative has spread across politics and society, with so many random accusations of hate speech or hate crime leading to controversy or worse, Charlie Kirk was shot dead in America by someone who had been persuaded that Kirk had been hateful against the trans community.

Last month, a teacher was referred to the national counter-terror program and forced out of his job after showing videos of Donald Trump to his sixth form politics student. These laws are crushing our country's free speech tradition, the heartland of our national character and the driver of our national success. Over the centuries in America, their First Amendment, their First Amendment is that Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech in our own history. George Orwell is venerated for saying free speech is worthless, and unless it extends to things that people do not want to hear, Lord Justice Sedley, venerated for saying free speech, includes not only the inoffensive but the irritating, the contentious, the eccentric, the heretical, the unwelcome and the provocative, provided it does not tend to promote violence, freedom only to speak.

Inoffensively, he said, is not worth having. We Revere our Queen Elizabeth the First, for saying she had no desire to look into a man's soul. But now we have judges looking into men's souls on a regular basis, along with the suppression of free speech, cancel culture has flourished. A woman in a Stoke on Trent focus group that I observed shocked me when she said to general agreement in the group, of course, none of us can say what we're really thinking.

The organisation freedom in the Arts than a large UK survey in 20 2425, 84% of artists say that they never, rarely, or only sometimes feel free to speak about their social or political opinions for fear of ostracism, bullying or loss of work. Until people can say, my Lords, what they're thinking so long, of course, as they don't incite imminent violence, then we do not have our traditionally free country. Turning to the key provisions in my amendment removing criminalisation or specific offensive words.

One, two, five A and five B, six and eight through 12. Provision one repeals the Malicious Communications Act 1988. A person can currently be sentenced under that act to up to two years if they send a letter or electronic message that either is intended to cause distress or anxiety, or that employs indecent or grossly offensive words. A well-known report from Big Brother Watch found that over a three year period, there were over 1000 charges and over 600 cautions under this act.

Provision two omits section one, two seven of the Communications Act 2003, jail for up to six months for sending a grossly offensive message or a message that's of an indecent, obscene or menacing character, or knowingly sending a false message to cause annoyance, inconvenience or needless anxiety, the Big Brother Watch report showed nearly 3000 charges and over 1000 cautions under section 127. These various numbers have probably increased, not declined, since that report. A lad stupidly joked on Twitter that if Robin Hood Airport wasn't going to be open next week, then he would blow it up.

He was convicted under section 127 and it took three appeals before that was overturned. The process was his punishment for someone who was innocent. Under these two acts, the Big Brother Watch report found at least 355 cases involving social media, with the rate increasing, not declining provisions five A and five B of my amendment. Amend section four of the Public Order Act 1986, up to six months, for intending to make likely, or cause someone to believe that immediate unlawful violence will take place when either using threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour, or distributing or displaying threatening, abusive or insulting signs.

My amendment leaves the word threatening in place, but removes the words abusive and insulting. Threatening behaviour involving imminent unlawful violence should clearly be illegal. But surely, my Lords, that is enough. Provision six removes sections four and five of the same act. Under 4AA person can go down for six months for intentionally using threatening, abusive or insulting signs or for disorderly behaviour causing harassment, alarm or distress to any person likely to be caused thereby. Section five does the same as for a, but for.

If no intent is shown and the the punishment is accordingly less. My provision seeks to remove criminalisation of causing harassment, alarm or distress, whether intentional or not. All the above seek to remove criminalisation of words that can, intentionally or otherwise, cause distress to an individual. For centuries, schoolchildren in our country were commonsensically taught in the playground. Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me. Well, of course some words did hurt to some degree, my Lords.

But through that saying, we all learned to be phlegmatic and move on in life regardless of what other people had to say. Provisions eight through 12 relate to the stirring up of racial hatred, either intentionally or where in the circumstances it is likely my amendment abolishes criminalisation of abusive or insulting words, while again keeping the word threatening again. I hope noble Lords will agree with me that threatening is sufficient here. My Lords current hate speech law goes too far in criminalising words and thoughts.

Basic freedoms are being trampled on. Frank expression of thoughts, fears or perceptions is suppressed, setting people free to speak their mind can indeed result in ugly or upsetting scenes. Most of us wish to be courteous and hate upsetting anybody, but some people do get upset easily. Moreover, bad actors can and often do claim to be or perform. Being upset. No free perform. Being upset. No free society should encourage that by over criminalising words. I beg to move. move.
14:32
14:32
Baroness Fox of Buckley Portrait Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-affiliated)
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I've added my name to this amendment 382 F, an amendment that has been carefully and proportionately, I think, taken on tackling problems of the ever growing number of overlapping acts and statutes that are used to limit free speech. If public order laws on protest are, to quote the Liberal Democrat benches from the other day. If protest laws are a confused mess, then I think the labyrinth patchwork affecting free speech is just an unpenetrable quagmire.

And the noble Lord has done a real public service here by very carefully going through how inadvertently and often by mission creep censorious laws undermine democratic speech rights and actually are damaging the UK's reputation internationally. Now, I'm not just talking about JD Vance or Elon Musk, who I know and I've heard commented on in this House, has dismissed nearly by many in Westminster as that's just Trumpist misinformation or hyperbole. But actually, I think we do need to recognise that even in the Bible of globalist liberalism, no, no less The Economist, they also last May featured a cover proclaiming Europe's free speech problem and identified the UK as one of the most censorious on the continent.

And I think there's a lot of they provided a lot of evidence. There's been lots of discussion all over the the political spectrum in relation to that idea of 12,000 arrests a year through 30 a day for speech offences that spring from laws this amendment seeks to rein in, but which this House is responsible for. And we're here talking about crime and policing, and the police are expected to treat speech offences as criminal acts, and the police are expected to police them.

Since the introduction of hate crime laws, which to remind you and has been reminded, a relatively recent concept popularised in the mid 1980s, the legislative and regulatory implications of restricting hate and words as said, that are said to have caused distress have proliferated, and it's grown into a real tangle of tripwires. And in such a tangle of tripwires, many people in the police, the CPS politicians, even they seem confused about what one can say legally and what's verboten.

I'm sure my Lords will remember the extraordinary story of the times radio producer Maxie Allen and his partner, Rosalind Levine. They were the couple who were arrested by six uniformed officers in front of their young children for posting disparaging messages about their daughter's school in a private WhatsApp group. Received a lot of publicity and they've just been paid, in fact, £20,000 for wrongful arrest, although they haven't received an apology. But what stood out from me about that story was that Miss Levine, when the police officers went into her house, asked what malicious communication offence they were being accused of, and the detective didn't know and had to Google, and then kind of read out what Google said.

Now that strikes me as not healthy. So I think that we as legislators have a responsibility to tackle this. Too often we just pass more and more laws, more restrictions on freedom, and never stop to look, if there's anything on the statute books that can be repealed, streamlined, rolled back. So I commend the noble Lord Lord Moynihan of Chelsea for his detailed, well-thought out, proportionate attempt at tackling the way the law has just grown and the negative impact it's having on democratic free speech.

But I also want to commend the noble Lord for his courage in taking on this issue, because, as we know, and he's referenced this, anyone taking on hate speech laws, I mean, when he told me he was doing it, I did gulp. I have to say, actually, you just think, oh my goodness, he's going to be accused of all sorts of things. He's going to be accused of being a bigot. It's a risk. And it's horrible to be accused of being a racist or a misogynist or homophobic or a hate monger or what have you.

But that's the very point. Being accused of being pro hate speech. If you oppose hate speech legislation is itself a silencing of a democratic discussion on laws and ways legislators should not be bullied or silenced in that way. And ironically, the best tool for any cultural shift in relation to prejudice, in my view, is free speech. To be able to take on bigotry, we need to be able to expose it, argue against it, use the disinfectant, in fact, of free speech to get rid of the hate.

Whereas censorship via hate speech laws does not eliminate or defeat regressive ideas, it just drives them underground to fester unchallenged. So the noble Lord Lord Moynihan has laid out the key legal problems, I think, in his approach to it, especially in relation to the lack of precision in terminology used across speech restricting laws. And I think he's raised a lot of real food for thought there. Perhaps I can just add a concern from a slightly different perspective to avoid repeating the points he's made.

For me, there's another cost. When law fails to clearly define concepts such as abusive words, insulting words, grossly offensive speech, what causes annoyance, inconvenience, and needless anxiety. All these things littered all over the law, and that is the dangerously that the dangerously elastic framing of what speech constitutes harm, or indeed hate, has been deeply regressive in terms of its impact on our cultural norms. There has been a sort of cultural mission creep, which is especially under mind, new generations of young people's resilience, the language of hate speech legislation now trips off the tongues of sixth formers in schools, university campus activists, when they complain that they disagree with or feel made to feel uncomfortable by a speaker or a lecturer, and they say that they should be banned, or that their views they will create things like that lecture has caused me harassment, alarm and distress straight out of the law.

It's like, where do you get that from? And they'll say that those words are perceived as harmful. And and if they hear them, it will trigger anxiety. Even post-traumatic stress disorders. Fashionable. It's become it's because we've socialised the young into the world of believing that speech is a danger to their mental wellbeing, and this has cultivated a grievance, victimhood. And it's a sort of circular firing squad, because then the young, who feel very frightened by words, which they kind of picked up and imbued from the way the law operates, then demand even more lawfare to protect themselves and their feelings from further distress, and that, you know, they're even encouraged.

And they go round taking screenshots of private messages, which they take to the police, or scrolling through people they don't like social media to see if there's anything they can use in the law. So I think that the the law has enabled the emergence of a kind of thin skinned approach to speech, and it's been institutionalised via our statute books, and the police don't seem immune to such interpretations of harmful words either, and can cause, I'm afraid themselves to weaponize the power that they have by these, the kind of muddle that we have here.

And I would say that it wastes police resources and energy very pertinent to this bill. So just a couple of examples to finish. In August 2023, a 16 year old autistic girl was arrested for reportedly telling a female police officer that she looked like a lesbian, a lesbian nana, now the teenager's mother, explained that this was a literal observation, i.e. the police officer looked like her grandmother, her nana who's a lesbian, but the officer understood it as a homophobic abuse. So a section five public order offence kicked in and on the on the basis of causing alarm and distress using abusive language.

But if you witnessed the film of the incident, seven police officers entered the teenage girl's home with her hiding in the closet, screaming in fear, punching herself in the face. And you might be able to ask who's who was distressed in that instance, the girl was held in custody for 20 hours. Ultimately, no charges were brought, but surely we have to ask if the statute book was has created such confused laws? Whether the statute book is encouraged, police overreach, whether the statute book encourage that young police officer who heard somebody say lesbian nana and immediately thought arrestor, hold her for 20 hours, say she's causing I mean, what happened there to the instincts of a police officer? They think that would be the answer many I speak to about the problems addressed by this amendment, by the way, suggest that it's all a problem that's been overstated.

They say, oh, the police are a bit too promiscuous in arresting people. Maybe, but the numbers charged or convicted of fairly stable. In fact, in some instances going down. I was told that by one journalist recently. But as legislators, shouldn't we query whether this implies the laws are giving too much leniency leeway? Sorry to the police to follow up malicious, trivial and politicised complaints, creating a chilling consequence by the notion of process as punishment. And I do think that's, you know, you might not be charged, but you're arrested.

And public law abiding citizens are humiliated, embarrassed with the cops at the door. I think it's a good idea for us to take this amendment very seriously, and I hope the Minister will give us a positive response.
14:42
Lord Blencathra Portrait Lord Blencathra (Conservative)
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Otherwise. >> It's a delight to listen to the noble Lady Baroness Fox of Buckley who hit the nail on the head. In fact, she hit many nails on the head. And I agree with everything she she she said, I support amendment 382F because it restores the proper boundary between criminal law and free expression. Criminal sanctions must be reserved for conduct that poses a real risk of harm, threats, menaces and conduct intended to intimidate, not for speech that merely offends or causes hurt feelings.

Section one, two, seven of the Communications Act and related provisions currently include abusive and insulting material and even communications that cause anxiety, a formulation that has produced inconsistent enforcement and a chilling effect on legitimate debate. I should, I should I have reported my Mis consultant when he told me a good news and bad news. The good news was he knew what it was. The bad news was it was Mis and he now wanted to check how spastic I was. And that spastic didn't sound terribly insulting term, but it referred medically to my condition.

And this morning, my Lords, I got a text message. Reminder your UCL appointment with a spasticity walking clinic at Queen square will take place early tomorrow morning. So, my Lords, we must make sure that we we don't treat all words or which may seem insulting as actually insulting. The law should be precise and proportionate. Vague criminal offences that hinge on subjective reactions invite overpolicing on online life and risk humiliating, criminalising, satire, political argument and and robust journalism. Recent parliamentary analysis shows arrests under communications offences have increased, while convictions have not kept pace, suggesting resources are being spent on low value prosecutions rather than genuine threats to safety.

And legal commentary also suggests difficulties courts face in applying terms like grossly offensive and insulting, and that undermines predictability and fairness. My Lords, this amendment does not leave victims without recourse. Civil remedies, harassment, injunctions, platform moderation and targeted civil criminal offences for stalking, doxing and and credible threats remain available and should be strengthened. That combination protects vulnerable people people, whilst ensuring criminal law is not used as a blunt instrument against free expression. Of course, there are trade offs.

Decriminalising insults means some distress will no longer affect criminal penalties, no longer attract criminal penalties. But the correct response is not to expand, expand criminal law. It is to improve support, rapid civil remedies and focus policing of genuine threats that approach better protects both free speech and personal safety for these amendments. For these reasons, I urge the noble Lords Minister to support amendment 38 to defend free expression, to sharpen the law so it targets real harm, and to ensure that our criminal justice system focuses on threats that endanger people, rather than on words that merely offend them.

Amen.
14:45
Lord Young of Acton Portrait Lord Young of Acton (Conservative)
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My Lords, I rise to support the >> My Lords, I rise to support the amendment tabled by my noble friend Lord Moynihan of Chelsea and the noble Lady Baroness Fox of Buckley, and I should declare my interest as the director of the Free Speech Union. I think the strongest argument for repealing the Malicious Communications Act in section one, two, seven of the Communications Act is that these laws were made during an analogue era and are clearly not fit for purpose during our current digital era.

And that's one reason the Law Commission of England and Wales, in its recommendation as to which communications laws should be reformed in a report in 2021, recommended that both the Malicious Communications Act and Section one, two seven of the Communications Act be repealed. That hasn't happened, but I think a good illustration of just how unfit these two particular pieces of law are has already been alluded to by the noble Lady Baroness Fox, which is the data obtained by the times.

Having submitted FOI requests to all 43 police forces in England and Wales, asking them how many arrests have been made in England and Wales in 2023 and in previous years for online offences under the Malicious Communications Act and Section one, two, seven of the Communications Act, and 37 of the 43 police forces responded to this FOI request, and in just those 37 police forces in just England and Wales, the answer was 12,183. That's 12,183 people who were arrested in 2023 under suspicion of having committed just these two.

One of these two offences by something they'd said online. And that is a huge increase on the number of people arrested under suspicion of committing these two offences for things they'd posted online in 2018, when the number was just 5502. So it had more than quadrupled in a five year period. And that boils down to 33 people every day in 2023 being arrested under suspicion of having committed just one of these two offences. The Communications Act and Section one, two, seven of the Communications Act.

And that's because of the explosion of speech, which is supposedly offensive, annoying, distressing, alarming, indecent, etc. online, on social media, something that the the framers of these laws could not possibly have anticipated and which is causing the police to waste a colossal amount of police time. But in addition, if you look at the number of people that were charged. So just bear in mind 12,183 people arrested, number charged in 2023 1119. So the police clearly are being overzealous in responding to complaints about supposed offences under these two pieces of law for things people have said online and another another index of just how much time is being wasted.

Many of the people who aren't charged end up having the episodes recorded as non-crime hate incidents, and I think one of the reasons, as best we can tell, the Free Speech Union has estimated that something like a quarter of a million non-crime hate incidents have been recorded since the concept was introduced by the College of Policing in 2014, and that's in England and Wales alone. That's an average of around 65 a day. One of the reasons so many inches have been recorded is because when the police arrest someone under suspicion of having committed an offence under the Malicious Communications Act or Section one, two, seven of the Communications Act, and conclude that, in fact, no, no offence has been committed.

The incident is recorded as an NCA and as I've said before in this House, one of the penalties for having an nchi recorded against your name is that it can show up in enhanced criminal records. Check when you apply for a job as a teacher or a carer, or try and volunteer for a charity like the Samaritans. According to Policy Exchange, police in the UK as a whole. Report published last year revealed police in the UK as a whole are spending 60,000 no 6000 hours a year, 6000 hours a year investigating episodes, incidents that turn out to be NCA and are recorded as such.

So I think that's a really strong argument for repealing the Malicious Communications Act and section one, two, seven of the Communications Act. And just to give two examples from the FSA's case files of just how absurd the police's overzealous policing of social media has become, we went to bat for one of our members called Julian Foulkes, a former special constable in Kent, he said in a spat online with a pro-Palestinian activist that some of the pro-Palestinian marchers were one step away from heading to Heathrow and stopping people disembarking from flights from Israel.

And that person complained. As I understand it, six police officers, six six police officers turned up at Julian Fuchs's home and arrested him, took him down to the station, wouldn't release him until he'd agreed to accept a caution. With our help, he got that caution expunged and then went on to sue the police for wrongful arrest and was given £20,000 in compensation and got an apology from the chief constable of the police force concerned. A good example of the kind of difficulty and the kind of time wasting the police are being led into because of the difficulty of enforcing these analogue laws in a digital era.

Just one more example. Maxie Allen and Rosalind Levine, two parents of two daughters. They were arrested again by six police officers in front of their youngest daughter because of things they'd said in a parents WhatsApp group. Which parents at their daughter's school were members of. And because of something they'd said in an email to the headteacher of their daughter's school, incredible that the police thought six police officers were needed to take these parents into custody. And Julian Fuchs, it was under suspicion of having committed an offence under the Communications Act.

In their case, it was under suspicion of having committed an offence under section one, two seven of the Communications Act. Again in due course no further action was taken. We helped them sue the police for wrongful arrest and they too were given compensation of £20,000 and be in no doubt my the noble Lady Baroness Fox of Buckley is correct when she says the process is the punishment. I think that was a phrase that my noble friend Lord Moynihan used to, even though no action, no prosecutions were made in those two cases, Julian Fuchs and the parents were were caused huge anxiety and distress by what they went through before the police decided to take no further action.

So I think that's a strong a strong case for repealing the following the Law Commission of England and Wales advice and repealing the Malicious Communications Act in Section one, two, seven of the Communications Act. Just briefly, I absolutely agree with the proposal in the amendment to remove the word insulting from the sections of the Public Order Act that it remains in, as I'm sure my noble Lords will not need reminding the the word insulting was removed from some sections of the Public Order Act, specifically from section five and related provisions by the Crime and Courts Act, 2013.

Following a campaign by Rowan Atkinson and others pointing out how absurd it was to criminalise insulting. In one case, a young man was arrested for insulting a police officer's horse. As you may recall, it was, it was, it was it was an effective campaign and it resulted in the word insulting being repealed from section five. But it remains in many other parts of the Public Order Act. And to my mind, the same arguments that were forcefully made by Rowan Atkinson and others at the time for repealing removing the word insulting from section five equally apply to the other sections of the Public Order Act, where it remains just as we don't have a right not to be offended, we don't have a right not to be insulted.

I'll just close with a quote from J.S. mill, which I believe is from On Liberty and mill warned that the proscription of uncivil language, the criminal proscription of uncivil language, is intrinsically likely to protect the holders of received opinion at the expense of dissidents. And he wrote with regard to what is commonly meant by intemperate discussion, namely invective, sarcasm, personality and the like, and we could add the word insulting to that list, that the denunciation of these weapons would deserve more sympathy if it were ever proposed to interdict them equally to both sides.

But it is only desired to restrain the employment of them against prevailing opinion, against the unprevailing. They may not only be used with general disapproval, but will be likely to obtain for him who uses them the praise of honest zeal and righteous indignation.
14:57
14:58
Baroness Brinton Portrait Baroness Brinton (Liberal Democrat)
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young made when he just quoted John Stuart Mill, because there is a second half to the sentence about the right to free speech. So mill says sole end for which mankind are warranted individually or collectively, in interfering with the liberty of action of any of their number, is self-protection the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of any civilised community, against his will, is to prevent harm unto others, and it is to prevent harm unto others that this entire debate is balanced upon.

I am sure that there are many justifications for freedom of speech, feeling that that it is being curtailed from people who just want to express their opinion. But the reasons that we have the laws we do at the moment is because of the harm that has been done over to others, particularly since the 1950s. And I think there was reference made earlier on to the Race Relations Act 60 years ago. Well, that was in the consequence of very, very overt racial harm done to entire communities in our society.

And John Stuart Mill would have absolutely supported that legislation to protect, because that is what the balance is between our freedom of speech and our responsibility as parliamentarians to protect, particularly the most vulnerable in our society. And that's why I just want to go back briefly. Well, not quite as far back as the race relation bills of 65 to when the original provisions to hate crimes were first introduced by the Blair government in 1998, there is no doubt that this was partly in response to growing concerns relating to the ineffective policing of, and legal responses to racist violence, which again then was very evident on our streets.

Lady Lawrence and her family had campaigned for this more robust legislative framework, not just because it was much clearer as a society that we didn't and shouldn't accept hate motivated crimes, especially toward particular communities and those with protected characteristics. My Lords, the UK may have left the EU, but we are still, as a country, very active. Members of the Council of Europe's, founded by Churchill to ensure that groups of people could not be targeted with impunity, either by governments or by others.

And I should add that at the moment I am a member of the current UK delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, and in May 2024, the Council of Europe published its recommendations on combating hate crime, which was signed by all Council of Europe Ministers, including by a conservative Minister on behalf of the UK, and the document focuses a great deal on the structure of justice for hate crimes, which is absolutely correct, after all. You know, this is really what we're talking about.

It's what leads us to crimes, and I suspect we'll get into more of that detail, both in the next group and also in amendment 416, which we'll probably debate on Thursday. I have to say, I'm actually really sorry that Lord Moynihan grouped them, because I think all there are overlapping issues right the way through on this. However, I do want to quote very briefly from this Council of Europe document. It says acknowledging that hate can be manifested with different degrees of severity, ranging from everyday stigmatisation and discrimination, microaggressions and verbal abuse to violence, terrorism, war crimes and genocide.

Now that is an enormous spectrum. And obviously most of the things that we've been talking about now are much, much earlier on in that scale. But we must understand that free speech, when it is not moderated by that do no harm principle, can lead to things like genocide. Think Rwanda. It is that escalation of minor incidents, including some of those that might be deemed to be abusive or insulting to the much more serious ones that are the problem, and which, for those on the receiving end, can undermine individuals to the absolute core of their being.

As a disabled woman, I have been on the receiving end of microaggressions discrimination in minor ways that most people wouldn't notice, and certainly to verbal abuse. And every time that it's happened, you think, do people really understand what they're saying when they're shouting right in your face? I suspect not, but sometimes things escalate. And that explains why the Council of Europe document has to chart this full range. So in 2016, I was on a train coming into Euston station on my way to your Lordships House, and the train was very crowded and a woman started to say very loudly, people like you shouldn't be allowed on trains until we've got to work.

And are you allowed out people like you? Everyone else looked down to the ground and pretended that they hadn't heard. I have learnt not to respond to nonsense like this, no matter how unpleasant it is. As we got off the train, she rushed past me and the assistant putting down the ramp, still shouting about me. She stopped dead in front of me, blocking my exit from the platform. Everyone else moved away to every other turnstile, but that was the only one that I could use.

And she was right in my way. And she then shouted directly at me again, using very abusive and insulting terms and coming right up to my face. She started dancing round my chair and then she tried to kick me, telling me to get the hell out of her life. I hadn't said a word at this point. Luckily, her aim wasn't very good and she hit her chair. Not me. And I suspect she rather hurt herself in doing that. Kicking steel is not a good thing to do.

After she'd gone, suddenly everyone wanted to help me. They called the British Transport Police, who took it very seriously. They understood the police, understood the rapid escalation and took a number of witness statements from staff and passengers. They spent a lot of time looking at CCTV. Now, if she had hit me and not the chair, it would have been assault. But she did not. It was still deeply upsetting to have abusive and insulting behaviour targeted at me for probably ten minutes because of my disability and because I could not respond.

The police talked to me that day about the boundaries of hate, crime and non-crime hate incidents, and said this sort of behaviour is very rarely one off and often escalates. So what did I learn from this incident? A decade ago I learnt that as a bystander, every one of us has a key role to intervene to reduce the tensions in any such incident and to publicly support the victim at the time. Imagine if it were your child, an elderly parent, a close friend facing this sort of treatment alone.

But imagine that the person you're seeing it happened to is someone who you should stand up for. And it is a reality of the last five years or so that many, not all people who only thought racist, homophobic, transphobic, disabled, cis abuse about people now believe that they can say and do anything they want with impunity under the banner of freedom of speech. And often it is targeted at the individual with that characteristic. This is free speech designed to harm, under Mill's definition.

Sadly, the woman in my case wasn't caught, mainly because no one moved until after she had gone. My concerns are that we need the full panoply of protection for vulnerable members of our community, who often experience much more than any of us can see or understand, and which, by the way, will also assist the police in trying to do their difficult job. In practical terms, this means the police must be able to record incidents that may not amount to a criminal offence, because in many cases, it is the course of conduct that's a phrase used in the business that together amount to harassment or other offences.

And if the police can't do that, then, for example, they would find it almost impossible to get enough evidence to charge someone with anti-Semitic or racially aggravated harassment or even stalking. I really do hope that the noble Lord is prepared to withdraw his amendment, and that we can have a sensible debate about where some of the boundaries are about freedom of speech and damage to individuals.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Before the the noble Lady finishes, or I didn't want to interrupt her because actually I interrupt her because actually I thought that was a very helpful contribution. And I think it does lay out the kind of dilemmas that lay out the kind of dilemmas that we face. But if I could just ask a couple of points of clarification couple of points of clarification or to see where we might agree or disagree in relation to John Stuart disagree in relation to John Stuart Mill's harm principle, does the noble Lady recognise that the concept of harm now has become so broad in terms of, for example, psychological harm, that it's become possible to say that any speech is harmful? And this is something that has led to the mess that we're in.

And so the concept of physical harm, as opposed to more, I think that speech is harmful. Any time that I've been cancelled from speaking, it's on the basis that I would cause harm for the students or pupils. And, you know, it gives a concept of me turning up with a baseball bat about to kind of, you know, do some harm to them. Whereas actually they were anticipating ahead of me speaking on on issues usually related to free speech, that I would harm them psychologically, that they would be damaged.

So it isn't that a problem for legislators in the context of this amendment? Secondly.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Can I know if you wouldn't mind? Because I would just like I just I know order, order. I'd just like to know order, order. I'd just like to remind you certainly are able to are able to to ask questions for clarification, but interventions clarification, but interventions are meant to be brief, and I'd urge some brevity, given the progress we've made in committee so, so far this afternoon. Thank you.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

this afternoon. Thank you. As this very briefly then, is there a problem that young people there a problem that young people do not appear to be able to distinguish between microaggressions and genocide? Is it one strong is it one line? And if the police can't.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

I'm very grateful for the noble Ladies intervention and questions. I would actually say with great I would actually say with great courtesy to the government whip, your first question doesn't relate your first question doesn't relate to the amendment because it's not about an offence. You were talking about an offence. You were talking about the pre banning of people and is harm so broad. However, that is a debate we need to have as society, and I think it does lead into the second question about can young people distinguish.

I actually think young people can distinguish. And I think part of the issue that us of the older generation don't understand is that they take a lot of them to take a great lot of care about their colleagues, because they have been brought up in a society with the rules, as opposed to having to introduce them where they have seen exactly the concerns that I was raising. So I think we need to continue to debate it. But bringing it back to the actual amendment we have in front of us today, I don't think any of those issues are about offences, and

**** Possible New Speaker ****

that's the point. My Lords, I'm grateful to noble Lords who have spoken in this Lords who have spoken in this really very interesting debate, and I'm grateful to my noble friend I'm grateful to my noble friend Lord Moynihan of Chelsea for moving the amendment. My Lords, I now rise the amendment. My Lords, I now rise to support amendment three A to F in the name of my noble friend. Although it ranges across several Although it ranges across several statutes, it is in truth a coherent proposal with a clear constitutional purpose, and that is to restore the proper limits of the criminal law so that freedom of speech is protected, while, of course, ensuring that genuinely threatening conduct remains criminal.

And at the outset I recognise the political sensitivity of this area. Any proposal to amend or repeal so-called hate speech provisions risks being misrepresented and as indifference to racism, misogyny or indeed homophobia or other forms of discrimination. And let me be absolutely clear that this is not the motivation behind this amendment. As my noble friend said, those of us on this side of the House oppose racism and discrimination in all their forms. The case for this amendment is not moral indifference, but legal realism.

And the the current framework has proved incoherent, ineffective and in some respects actively counterproductive. I Lord Jones my hon. Friend Lord Moynihan of Chelsea most ably set out the current legislative framework dealing with offensive language, hate speech, and the like is a messy, tangled web of patchwork offences. We have the Malicious Communication Act of 1998, sections four, five and parts three and three A of the Public Order Act 1986 and section one, two seven of the Communications Act 2003, and these provisions criminalise speech not because it threatens direct harm, but because it is deemed abusive, insulting, or said to cause a person needless anxiety.

Now, I'm not ignorant to the fact that we have had laws in this country prohibiting the usage of threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour for almost a century. Section five of the Public Order Act 1936. Now, of course, repealed, but stated that any person who in any public place or at any public meeting uses threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour with intent to provoke a breach of the peace, or whereby a breach of the peace is likely to be occasioned, shall be guilty of an offence.

But there are two crucial differences between that piece of legislation and the legislation we are discussing today. The 1936 act was, of course, set against the background of rising fascist paramilitaries, firstly, of course, in Italy and then in Germany and indeed in Britain, and secondly, using such language with intent to provoke a breach of the peace is very different from outlawing insulting language likely to cause a person needless anxiety. And I think even a child could understand the difference between inciting a riot and causing a person, a person mild offence.

And yet this is where we are. A person can claim to have been caused annoyance or inconvenience, complained to the police and have another individual investigated and indeed potentially arrested. This is not hyperbole. It is the truth. There is a litany of recent examples that we could trawl through some of the mentioned today, but many of these have been mentioned by other, as I say, other noble Lords, I will, I'll only mention a few and keep it as brief as I can.

The Malicious Communications Act 1988 was used to arrest, as we've heard, Maxine Allen and Rosalind Levine, the two parents who were referred to and the same act was also used to arrest a 17 year old boy for comments he posted on Tom Daley's Twitter account, the boy posted and I quote, you let your dad down. I hope you know that, unquote. Whilst this is obviously poor behaviour to claim, it should be a matter for the law and that it constitutes criminality is deeply concerning.

And section one, two seven of the Communications Act 2003 was used to prosecute a person who posted a picture online with a phallus drawn on it. Jordan Baruch was ordered to pay £400 in compensation for a post that did not cause any harm to anyone. Again, how has this case ended up as a matter for the authorities, is beyond me. Of of fundamental importance is the fact that the terms we are dealing with here are not precise legal concepts. They are elastic, subjective and dependent on perception rather than consequence.

And the result of is uncertainty for the public, inconsistency in enforcement, and an unhealthy transfer of quasi judicial discretion to individual police officers who recently have taken to very liberal and indeed unequal enforcement of these laws. And there has emerged what can only be described as two tier policing of these offences. Alaa Abd El-Fattah was welcomed with open arms into this country and the Lord Chancellor, despite having posted on Twitter that he had hated white people and he wanted to Jews killed.

He was not arrested for his tweets. And yet Graham Linehan, who was met at Heathrow Airport by five armed police officers and arrested for tweets that were apparently transphobic. If this does not demonstrate the unequal application of these speech laws, then I really don't know what will. Importantly, my noble friend's amendment does not remove offences involving imminent violence. On the contrary, it leaves the word threatening firmly in place. What it removes, other words abusive and insulting, and the offences based solely on causing some form of emotional response.

And this distinction matters. Threats create fear of violence and undermine public order. They rightly attract criminal sanction, insults and offence, however unpleasant, are part of life in a free society, and to criminalise them is to invite the state into a realm of thought, belief and expression, and any democratic society has to undergo a delicate balancing act when it comes to the permissibility of speech. On the one hand, freedom of speech is a fundamental right that underpins the entire basis of a free society.

On the other hand, in a civilised society, there is speech that we simply cannot accept direct incitement to violence, promotion of terrorist behaviour and the like. The question then becomes where do we draw the line? And it is my firm belief that whatever we might have placed this imaginary line in the past, it is now creeped so far in one direction that we are faced with a state of affairs that must be now subject to some form of correctional medicine. Precisely what form that medicine takes is a different question.

Today, my noble friend Lord Moynihan of Chelsea has set out his proposed solution, and I know the government has commissioned the noble Lord, Lord MacDonald, to review the state of public order and hate crime legislation. And we await that review with bated breath. But it is not enough for the government to simply instigate a review and then refuse to give an indication of their direction of travel, and I hope the noble Lord, the Minister, will be able to say a little more than simply we must wait for the outcome of the review, because I have to say to the noble Lord, it's it is an excuse that is beginning to wear a little thin.
15:17
Lord Hanson of Flint Portrait Lord Hanson of Flint, The Minister of State, Home Department (Labour)
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Can I thank the noble Lord Moynihan of Chelsea for the way in Moynihan of Chelsea for the way in which he has put his arguments today, and I fully accept his contention that they're not designed to include his belief in racism or discrimination. And I accept all of that. And that was the point that he's made, and I accept the way in which he's done it. And I think that that is a fair and open way. And again, the same comments apply to the noble Lady Fox of Buckley, the Lord Blencathra and the Lord Young of Acton.

I understand the motivation from where they're coming from, but I have to say straight away to the House and to the Committee that I don't agree with the direction of travel will resist the direction of travel and will explain why in my comments here today. Before I do that, can I just say, and I hope this is helpful to the noble Lord Bach Lord Young of Acton, that the issues in which he's raised around non-crime hate incidents, we are going to come to those at a later debate.

As he knows, in amendments 416, and the College of Policing is producing a report and review chaired by the noble Lord Herbert as the chair of the College of Policing, I give the commitment to the House Committee today that that review will be coming forward before the Report stage of this bill, and we intend to look at that as a government and respond to that. And when we have that debate on 460, the points that the noble Lord Young of Acton has mentioned today for the debate, I think I'll probably more relevant to that if he accepts my comments today, and we will revisit that in due course.

But the amendment 3 to 8 F, which proposes to repeal the Malicious Communications Act of 1988 and to make significant changes to the Communications Act of 2003 at the Public Order Act of 1986. I know the motivation that the noble Lord Moynihan of Chelsea has brought forward, but they do include removing key provisions that have been in place for many years that were passed under different governments of political complexity, and that have been consistently applied in case law and the terms the noble Lord seeks to omit from the Public Order Act 1986 are understood by the police.

The CPS. There is case law interpreted by the courts. And those provisions, I would argue, to the Committee today, provide the police with proportionate tools to manage low level public disorder and protect the public from threatening or abusive behaviour, as well as from those who seek to stir up racial hatred. And I would add that the existing legal framework already ensures that enforcement decisions are made proportionately and in line with human rights obligations, including the right of freedom from expression.

But I would again emphasise to the committee, and I think the noble Baroness Brinton's personal example shows that these laws are here for a purpose. They are here for a purpose. And I just say to the committee as a whole, and I think Baroness Brinton, you know, comments have highlighted this, how would each of us individually like to be on the receiving end of an abusive or insulting comment or phrase about a personal characteristic that we personally could not potentially change about our life? Attack me for my politics by all means, because that's the view I've taken.

But to attack individuals or to have insulting or offensive behaviour to individuals for characteristics they can't change is, I think, a step that we need to consider very carefully. And I just say to the noble Lord Moynihan that let's just look at what his amendment seeks to remove. 328F the amendment would repeal the following the Malicious Communications Act of 1988, removing the offence of sending a letter, electronic communication or article to someone that has indecent that is grossly offensive if the purpose of sending it is to cause distress or anxiety to the recipient.

Now that is that is, that's quite a heavy protection for people that the noble Lord is seeking to remove. Section one, two, seven of the Communications Act 2003, removing the offence with his amendment of sending or causing to be sent a message or or matter by means of a public electronic communication network that is grossly offensive, obscene, indecent or menacing. Now again, those protections are there under that act of 2003 to protect individuals from grossly offensive, obscene, indecent or menacing communication.

Yet the noble Lord seeks to remove it today for reasons that he's outlined to the committee today. Sections four and five of the Public Order Act, 1986 remove the offences under this amendment of intentional harassment, alarm or distress, or and harassment, alarm or distress without intent and the amendment would remove abusive or insulting from the Public Order Act 86. Offences of causing fear or provocation of violence, of use of words, of behaviour written to stir up racial hatred, of publishing or distributing written material to stir up racial hatred, and of publishing performance of a play intended to stir up racial hatred.

Now I want to protect free speech, and I will argue and ensure that the importance of protecting free speech is absolutely right. But we have to also protect rights of individuals to enjoy a life free of grossly offensive, intentional harassment, abusive or insulting material. Section 21, which he seeks to repeal, would be distributing a play or recording to stir up racial hatred in the way in which abusive or insulting would be added. So the amendment appears to be intending to strengthen protections for free speech.

And I understand where the noble Lord wishes to come from on that. And that's a fair and open debate between us. But it does so by decriminalising behaviour that is in the face of the law, in all those acts, abusive and insulting. And I'm sorry, my Lords, in this committee, I'm not going to accept that on behalf of the government in relation to the approach that he's taken. Now, we do have the reviews. We know from the Lord Macdonald of River Glaven who's going to look at the wider issues of hate crime legislation, and he's going to look at the independent review of public order.

And I do take the strictures of the noble Lord Davies of Gower that we can't stick everything into the review, but we do have the review from the College of Policing, which I'll refer to and have done in response to the noble Lord Young of Acton. And we do have that review looking at those issues, but I still think, you know, given what the noble Baroness Brinton has said, that there's a basic flaw from which society needs to protect individuals from abuse and insulting behaviour, and the existing offences are not just used to put that flaw in place, but they're also used.

And this is a really important point, and I know probably the noble Lord will accept this. There also used to ensure that the police have the ability to intervene early in public order situations where they could help support the protection for vulnerable people who may be alarmed by abusive or insulting conduct, which has a disproportionate impact, and the existing offences are used to manage public order and racial hatred, and provide the police with proportionate tools to respond to a range of behaviour.

Now the the offence thresholds should not and do not interfere with free speech. The review is going to conclude very shortly and the government will consider and respond to those recommendations afterwards. But I hope in in my response, I simply say to the noble Lord that I would really hope he thinks very carefully, as I know he has already. So I'm not going to be patronising. Sorry. I hope he will think very carefully about the content of the debate that's had today, about the comments that I've put to him, about why those legislation aspects have been passed by a Thatcher government and by a Blair government, and why there is a need to protect individuals simply along the lines that the noble Baroness Brinton mentioned in her experience.

They're there for a purpose, my Lords, and I believe this committee should ask the noble Lord to, having heard the debate, withdraw them, and I hope not revisit them

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at report. Well, thank you, my Lords, for

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Well, thank you, my Lords, for what I hope everybody felt was a stimulating and and useful debate stimulating and and useful debate with a great deal of differing views expressed by different noble views expressed by different noble Lords. I thank Baroness Fox for her eloquent support of this amendment, eloquent support of this amendment, and it was so depressing to hear her point out that we, the original home of free speech, are now seen around the world as one of the worst countries in suppressing it.

My noble friend Lord Blencathra presented the the the case for this amendment rather more eloquently than I was able to and and equally with eloquent personal experience to which which I felt was interesting as in as indeed in our talk about that in a minute, that the noble Baroness Brinton and my noble friend Lord young in in again far more eloquent terms than I, gave stark evidence of the dysfunctionality of the law with the huge numbers of interventions by the police, 12,183 arrests was one statistic he quoted in one year alone for just one act.

And I would add to the various comments that all those talk mentions of where the police were forced to pay £10,000, £20,000, £20,000 in compensation, that just let's remember, my Lords, is not police money. That's our money. I would really rather like to see that money spent in better ways, and police time to be spent in better ways. I thank the noble Lord Strasburger for his brief intervention, and maybe I should move on to the to the very affecting speech by the noble Baroness Brinton.

She, she she was talking about how hate material should be legislated against, and I will address that in in the next amendment, which comes immediately. And by the way, I can assure her that I played no part in the grouping of my amendments from those of Lord young. I, I was really sorry, deeply sorry to hear of that awful, appalling incident that you had to suffer. The noble Baroness had to had to suffer at the railway station. I agree entirely that that civil society, the people there, and if that had been us there should have intervened, should have supported her, and it must have been just dreadful to have sat there with no support until, of course, after the event, when there was plenty of it.

But I would just point out that I believe. If you, perhaps the noble Baroness, would like to go back and look at at Hansard tomorrow that my amendment left in place, left completely in place, the ability of the police to go after that dreadful person who abused you because she was threatening imminent violence with that, whether it was accurately placed or not, that would that that was violence. And and I absolutely agree with that law that that should have gone after her.

And by the way, facial recognition might have helped going back to it.
15:30
Lord Moynihan of Chelsea Portrait Lord Moynihan of Chelsea (Conservative)
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For giving way. I think the problem for the police in that particular case, and I'm going to particular case, and I'm going to focus on it because it's the issue that we're trying to get to, is where is the boundary between free speech and abusive behaviour is actually they would have had problems saying that it was threatening if she just said, oh, I threatening if she just said, oh, I was just dancing around the chair. And they, you know, this is what they explained to me at the time, the issue that they protected me was that she was abusive and she was insulting, and they could record it and they could have they been able to find her, have checked to see if it had happened elsewhere, which is what they thought would have been likely.

And and that also moves into the area of the next group. So I won't talk any further. But thank you. I'm very grateful for him raising that.

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The noble Baroness for that explanation. And indeed I think she she clearly demarcated our she clearly demarcated our difference in view as to where the difference in view as to where the line should be drawn. I wish to suggest to noble Lords that it is suggest to noble Lords that it is important to draw the line at the threat of imminent violence, and that has been a principle in the that has been a principle in the past. But, but, but has been breached by, by by recent laws and actions by the police.

The noble

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Lord Davies kindly supported this amendment. I hate to interrupt. I hate to

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I hate to interrupt. I hate to interrupt the the the the noble Lords, but I just thought it was time to point out that when, when when pressing or withdrawing an amendment, members should normally be be brief and they its companion is pretty clear. You don't have to respond to all points raised in the debate, and we're now over five minutes. So I'd urge the noble Lord

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minutes. So I'd urge the noble Lord to conclude his his remarks. I do remember the noble Lord Katz taking almost 30 minutes the night before last, when he had when he had a time limit of 20 minutes. But I but I felt his remarks were so interesting that I didn't feel like opining and. I, I certainly would have finished by now had had there not been interventions. I only have. I wish to thank the noble Lord Davis for his kindly and eloquently supporting my views and and turn finally to the noble Minister, the noble Lord Hanson of Flint, who who, while speaking in the most as always, kindly way, gave a most disappointing reply.

I hope that after the debate, immediately following on the next amendment, he might be he might reconsider. I was I was surprised to understand that he still supported criminalisation of offending feelings after such a comprehensive listing by many speakers this afternoon of the problems created by that in the in the various laws. I will talk more on this in the next amendment, but

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meantime, and for now, I will withdraw. This amendment. Is it your Lordships pleasure

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Is it your Lordships pleasure the amendment be withdrawn? The amendment is by leave withdrawn. amendment is by leave withdrawn. Amendment 382 G the Lord Moynihan

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of Chelsea. I was so busy enjoying my moment

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I was so busy enjoying my moment that I that I momentarily mislaid my notes. My Lords my amendment remove criminalisation of offensive speech. This second amendment removes criminalisation of hate as a motive. Mostly this relates to where if a particular kind of hate directed at particular protected characteristics is proved to be involved, then the crime is considered to be aggravated, so the sentence is then increased. It also includes crimes associated with the stirring up of hatred, enhancing convicted person's sentence for an aggravated offence is a peculiar idea.

In his latest Netflix special, which I'm quite sure most noble Lords have watched at least once, the comedian Ricky Gervais directly mocks this law to loud audience applause. Recognition of the foolishness of the idea has now spread into popular culture. If I kick you to the ground either for no reason, I. I'm not very good at fighting, so I probably wouldn't my laws. But but if I did, either for no reason or let's say because you had I hated your ginger hair and I cause you grievous damage.

I go to jail for five years, but if I do exactly the same because I hate your sexual orientation or some other protected characteristics, that's, say, ten years. This, Ricky Gervais pointed out, implies that motiveless crime, or indeed one motivated by hate against a non protected characteristic is not as bad as the same crime where there is hatred against a particular protected characteristic. I find that my Lords nonsensical. So did he, and as he said to applause, it's a crime.

Punish the crime. Certainly prosecution would be far simpler, investigations far more straightforward if we just address the crime, not the thoughts behind it. The whole idea of punishing thought is what used to be described as happening in a totalitarian state. Thought crime directly stirring up violence should, of course, be criminalised, but criminalising the stirring up of hatred towards people with protected characteristics falls foul of free speech concerns in two different ways. First, you criminalise someone's words through proving a very hard to discern intent to stir up based on the individual's protected characteristics.

And second, you criminalise their having stirred up certain specified, equally hard to discern thoughts about people with those protected characteristics in other people's minds. Note, my Lords, that the current popularity of the TV series traitors is precisely because of how impossible it is to detect another's hidden thoughts. If those clever people on TV can't do it, what chance has a court? It would be far better just to criminalise the stirring up of violence. After all, if violence is stirred up, then a conviction occurs, so no further prosecution is necessary.

Well, if no violence is stirred up, why, given the concerns that will be raised about free speech and the like, criminalise the words. The key provisions in this amendment are first to appeal or omit parts. Romans three and Arabic Lord Reay of the Public Order Act 1986, which increases the imprisonment term to up to seven years, where, in addition to the original crime, there is also the intentional stirring up of hate or likelihood that hate will be stirred up based on race, religion, or sexual orientation, not the noble Lady.

Brinton will note. Disability, interestingly enough. Second, to omit sections 28 to 33 of the Crime and Disorder Act 1988, which increased the imprisonment term to up to 14 years for when an assault, criminal damage, public order offences or harassment is racially or religiously aggravated, and third, to omit section 66 of the Sentencing Code, which increases sentences for certain crimes where there is, in addition, hostility to actual or presumed racial religious disability, sexual orientation, or transgender characteristics, stirring up, intentional or otherwise, is considered an aggravator that leads to higher sentences.

Although there is, I should mention a somewhat ambiguous partial get out for religious hostility, I won't repeat the points I made in the previous amendment speech about the multiple ways in which these laws fail to work, but I did then promise to talk in particular during this amendment about the way in which hate crime law is clogging up the judicial system. So here goes on. That first, police forces, they're wasting thousands of hours on investigating hate crime allegations, dozens of arrested every day, as my noble friend Lord Young of Action pointed out for online posts, around 140,000 hate crimes recorded annually across race, sexual orientation, religious religion, disability and transgender, the police are now being sued for wrongful arrest by, among many, Graham Linehan, the noble Baroness.

Lady Nicholson has alleged that in that case, the police were manipulated into the arrest by a transgender former police constable who had some time before been dismissed for gross misconduct. A general public perception now arises that phone theft is downplayed, shoplifting, ignored, carjacking, burglaries, sexual offences all have less time spent on them than if the police could focus on them, rather than being distracted by their pursuit of hate crime. Second, the Crown Prosecution Service is flummoxed by what the law actually says.

Isabelle Vaughn Spruce has been left in legal limbo for almost a year after being arrested for standing in silence in an abortion buffer zone, with the CPS still unable to decide whether she should be prosecuted or not, she's already received five figure payouts from the police. As I mentioned, that's our money for previous unlawful arrests. But again, the year long process is her punishment. The Quran burners violent knife attacker was only given a suspended sentence, yet the CPS is still seeking to convict the Quran burner himself of a criminal offence, using the violence of his attacker as proof that the Quran burning stirred up disorder.

This, my Lords, is a blasphemy law in all but name. The law Lord Jonathan Sumption has pointed out that the CPS has issued official advice that hatred can include ill will, ill feeling, spite, contempt, prejudice, unfriendliness, unfriendliness. So now, my Lords, we have compelled friendliness, antagonism, resentment and dislike, and the CPS showed their advanced level of confusion by advising that evidence of hostility is not required for an incident or crime to be recorded as a hate crime or hate incident.

They have now withdrawn that last piece of advice, but not before sowing much confusion. We cannot blame the CPS too much, my Lords. The legislation is overall a dog's dinner. The list of hate words in the actual legislation is long anxiety, insulting, distress, harassment, alarm, threatening, annoyance, inconvenience, abusive. In some of the hate crime laws, only 1 or 2 of these words appear. In others. Up to five of those words appear, but never the full nine of the words in any of the legislation.

Distress happens to be the most favoured word in the legislation. It appears in seven out of the 11 laws. Poor old annoyance only appears in one of these laws. And as for the five protected characteristics that are mentioned in the various laws, again, an incoherent mishmash. Some hate laws mention only one protected characteristic, while only the Sentencing Code mentions all of them. Transgender appears the least frequently. Now, of course, my Lords, we could, with difficulty, make an attempt to help the CPS by clearing all of this up.

But we could also sort the problem out much more easily by just abandoning this whole hate crime approach, focusing on the deed rather than the thought in what we prosecute. Third, the courts are a burden. The government is proposing to abolish many jury trials because the courts are overworked. Well, if we got rid of hate crime laws, isn't that a better way to free up court time? And because of the ambiguity in the law, it's a postcode lottery.

At the court's acquittals on the silent prayer issue in Birmingham. But convictions in Bournemouth forth the prisons are overburdened. I estimate just a few hundreds, very likely less, hate crime offenders currently imprisoned. But given the recent reports of a crime wave due to violent prisoners having been released early, surely every single freed up prison place that could come from abolition of these laws should count as a blessing. And I'd almost, my Lords, forgotten to include the probation service, but was handily reminded that they are burdened as well by a newspaper article today revealing that Lucy Connolly I don't think I need to say who she is, has been told by her probation officer that she was risking being sent back to jail after spending around a year there for a tweet.

After some member, some random unknown member of the public, complained that they were offended and that she was inciting violence because she had retweeted a meme suggesting that Donald Trump should send troops to kidnap Keir Starmer. Now, as far as I know, my Lords, there quite possibly some Labour peers and MPs who share her sentiment. But even if they express that sentiment in public, I would argue that they should definitely not go to jail for doing that. It's just yet another example of the metastasisation of these hate laws and a waste of probation officers time.

All of these problems. Could my Lords be resolved? Where were we to cut out or severely cut back on this large and recently introduced body of hate crime law? I urge noble Lords to embrace the benefits of cleaning up and slimming down our criminal law, focusing better on the real physical and cyber crime that besets our country at this time and and that in many cases goes unpursued and unpunished because there are not enough judicial resources to pursue these crimes vigorously, enough to which end I beg to move this amendment.



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Proposed after clause 126, insert the new clause as printed on

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the Marshalled List. I was. Sorry, it's the return of the double act. Can I thank the noble double act. Can I thank the noble Lord Lord Moynihan for his excellent explanation of this amendment, and also his intention amendment, and also his intention
15:46
Baroness Fox of Buckley Portrait Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-affiliated)
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of tabling it? I, I think that it's difficult whenever you I mean, you know, if the last group was tricky, then the, you know, getting rid of hate crime, it's a bit like, what am I doing here? But anyway, I'm going to carry on regardless and try and unpick why I think this is so important. One thing that I, I'm very aware of is, is that the accusation of hate crime or, or hate speech in any way can really make you stutter and stammer and look the other way.

The noble Lady Baroness Brinton, when she talked, told that story of the abuse that she received and the way that everybody stayed quiet until the incident was over and then rushed up to her, reminded me of what it feels like at the moment to have unpopular views. I mean, very often you're kind of being attacked and then people all kind of come up to you afterwards and kind of squeeze your arms. So I did agree with what you said, but they don't say it out loud.

There's an awful lot of people who look away because they're frightened that they'll be accused of supporting hate. And the best example that this House has discussed endlessly is the consequences for hundreds of thousands of young women in towns and throughout the land who basically were abused and raped and sexually assaulted because people in official positions social workers, teachers, people who knew that they were being abused in that way were frightened that if they complained, they would be accused of Islamophobic, racist hate.

And so they were quiet. And the noble Lady Baroness Casey report makes that clear, as does all other discussion on that question. So in other words, it's difficult this one. But we've got to keep going. What is a hate crime for the purposes of legislators? Lord Sumption already quoted. But he explains it this way. He says the Crown Prosecution Service and the police have agreed to define a hate crime as anything which is perceived by the victim or anyone else, to be motivated by hostility or prejudice.

In other words, the definition which they use is subjective. If the complainant thinks it's a hate crime, then it's a hate crime that is extraordinarily dangerous, as it inevitably makes denying the charge of saying, I'm not a hate criminal, I'm that's not hate crime. What I've just said you, you've got no defence, but it empowers a complainant as a victim who can't be challenged. This, and it's been proven to be the case, is incredibly divisive in society. It incites people, in fact, to adopt a victim label.

And in a period of identity politics and protected characteristics, it undermines equality before the law, which, in reference to something else that the the noble Lady Baroness Brinton said in the 1980s, as somebody active in anti-racist politics who at that time it was to have equality before the law rather than discrimination, and was actually not an argument. So much focusing on words, but on making sure that people were treated equally, not spoken to nice in different terms. Although that was a bit of an argument.

That was never something that was demanded by those of us involved in those fights. Ironically, for many, for the aim of hate speech, sorry, hate speech laws for many people is to create a kinder society, a nicer society. But as the noble Lady Baroness Chakrabarti who's not in her place, reminded us in Second Reading, and and I'm paraphrasing her, she said certain legislation in the early 90s raised public expectations that governments could legislate their way to a harmonious society.

You know, eradicate an emotion like hate. And indeed, it's a theme that The Economist's feature I mentioned earlier picks up. It said the aim of hate speech laws is to promote social harmony, yet the scant evidence they work suppressing speech with the threat of prosecution appears to foster division. When the law forbids giving offence, it creates an incentive for people to claim to be offended, thereby using the police to silence a critic or settle a score with a neighbour. When some groups are protected by hate speech laws to to to demand, others demand protection too.

Thus, the effort to stamp out hurtful words can create a taboo ratchet, with more and more areas deemed off limits, and before long, this hampers public debate. It is hard to have an open, frank exchange about controversial issues like immigration, say, if one side fears that expressing its views will invite a visit from the police. And that's really what this amendment's getting at, which is removing hate crime is not going from the statute books, is not mean that we're going to live in a hateful society.

Hate crime on the statute books encourages people actually to be divisively toxically antagonistic to each other. Next, on aggravated offences, the idea that you get a longer sentence if it's alleged that you're motivated by hate, and the concept of stirring up hate, removing specific acts that are crimes from the fourth sorry, removing specific acts that are crimes from thoughts or speech or the speech behind them, I think conflates dangerously speech and action. And when hate crime laws require that the authorities in further perpetrators belief and assigns greater punishment based on ideological motive, I think it can lead to some very perverse criminal justice outcomes which matter to legislators.

In this CPS recent report or recent hate crime prosecutions, there was a telling, shocking example. A man was put in jail for 20 weeks for assaulting his father's sister and a police officer and using racist slurs against his sister's partner. Actually, 20 weeks in. A bit low to me as it goes. But anyway, then the detail was revealed. The CPS explains that actually, for assaulting his father's sister in a police officer, the person who was found guilty received a community order.

They received the 20 weeks in prison for the racist slur. So for the assault, you can retain your freedom. But for the racist words, you get 20 weeks in jail. Isn't that confusing? There are endless examples I could cite, but I think that it's no wonder then, that particularly young people, rather than actually being super sensitive as was described earlier, are actually super sensitive to words they find difficult, and they actually think speech is violence and can't distinguish between physical threats, physical harm, and what they imagine to be harmful speech, which in turn justifies using physical violence against hate speech they hear, which was brutally illustrated, I think, by Charlie Kirk's assassination, somebody whose politics I didn't agree with, but who basically was seen to be a hate criminal.

And if all speech is violence, then basically you can use violence back. I think these are regressive cultural fruits of vaguely drafted laws that give a vast and subjective discretion. And I think it is adding to the atmosphere of toxicity and cancel culture. I know that if just to finish off, I know that all roads lead back noble Lord MacDonald. River of River review. But I really would actually ask the noble Lord, the Minister, if he can explain what's the point of the review if, when he's looking at the provisions such as public order offences and some of these issues? And I know he's he's very concerned about free speech, if we're going to just say that the status quo works.

I think that hate crime legislation is getting us in a mess. The noble Lord says absolutely disagrees. But actually the government has asked for a review of these very ideas. Surely the noble Lord, the Minister, might be open minded to that review, if not to the noble Lord, Lord Moynihan, or myself or other people who've spoken, so might there be some flexibility from the noble Lord, the Minister, in thinking that possibly, just possibly legislators before this government brought in some bad laws that at the very least we should look at them again, and that maybe, just maybe, hate crime legislation is making society more hateful, young people more anxious and frightened people more anxious and frightened

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and actually is bad for democracy. I wish to speak very briefly in. Opposition to this amendment,

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Opposition to this amendment, but I will resist the temptation to give a Second Reading speech. My give a Second Reading speech. My understanding is that it would abolish the entire statutory framework relating to hate crime framework relating to hate crime and hatred based offending. Now, I've been a blatant homosexual for
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Baroness Hunt of Bethnal Green Portrait Baroness Hunt of Bethnal Green (Crossbench)
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I've been a blatant homosexual for many, many decades, and and part of that look means that you do evoke some hatred as you walk around the streets of Cardiff in 1993, certainly where no hate crime legislation existed in relation to sexual orientation. And the message I got at that age was that the state agreed with the offences that I was experiencing, because I didn't know that the state supported me in the last year, when I was in Shoreditch, a group of men surrounded me and my partner and got up in our faces and used unequivocally homophobic language.

And we didn't report it as a hate crime. But we were frightened and discombobulated. And my response was, but it sure ditch was my middle class shorthand for there are so many lesbians in this area. What exactly are you going to do if you think that this hate is going to be acceptable here? So I did, however, feel utterly supported by the state a year ago because I knew that legislation existed that made that kind of offence unacceptable. But as has been outlined, there is no single offence of hate crime.

What exists is a framework across several acts, aggravated forms of certain basic offences. And I look forward to the government amendment in their manifesto relating to disability and sexual orientation and gender identity. On that to come at Report stage. Enhanced sentencing where hostilities proved on grounds of race, religion, sexual orientation, disability and gender identity, and offences such as stirring up racial or racial or religious hatred. It's my understanding that this amendment would dismantle that network in its entirety.

Those who have concerns about the recording of Non-crime hate incidents, which I have sympathy with, or about proportionality in relation to hate crime, which I also have sympathy with. Those can and should be addressed as matters directly, but those issues are distinct. Wholesale repeal of criminal protections is not a measured response, in my view, to broader free speech concerns. My Lords, I find it impossible to ignore the context. Official Home Office figures record 137,550 hate crimes in England and Wales in the year ending March 2025.

As a resident of Bethnal Green, I'm acutely aware of hate crime in relation to anti-Semitism and anti-Muslim sentiment. It exists across all the streets and the graffiti is going up and up in relation to both those things. On anti-Semitism specifically, the same. Home Office Bulletin records 2873 religious hate crimes targeted at Jewish people in the year ending March 2025, and note that the previous year saw a very sharp rise and a spike following the start of the Israel-hamas conflict.

In addition, Community Security Trust recorded 3528 antisemitic incidents across the UK in the calendar year 2024. I share that data because what we measure, we manage and understanding these spikes and seeing these patterns matter, and what the hate crime legislation gives us is a mechanism for measuring and managing those spikes and those incidents where reporting shows acute risk. His Majesty's Government has acted. In October 2023, the conservative government increased the Jewish Community Protective Security Grant to 18 million for 2324, and that figure was maintained in 2425.

That is right and proper, and a reasonable and justified response to that spike in hate crime that was measured. Because this legislation exists, my Lords, one can believe deeply in freedom of expression. And I do sympathise and and actually agree more than people might think with the previous amendment and some of the comments that we've had so far. But I think the law must recognise and respond to crimes intended to intimidate whole communities. This amendment, in my view, would remove the very tools that allow the police and courts to identify, mark and properly sentence hostility motivated offending.

For those reasons, I would request this

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amendment is withdrawn. Very useful and nuanced

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Very useful and nuanced contribution from the noble Lady. If I could just clarify, she's If I could just clarify, she's absolutely right to notice, to notice the rise of, for example, notice the rise of, for example, anti-Semitic hate against Jews, but the amount of hate crimes being recorded has gone up hugely, despite the proliferation of hate crime legislation. Does that not rather imply that hate crime legislation is not stopping hate crime?

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The noble Lady for her intervention? And I think it's a really important question, and I'll try to remember to keep speaking in try to remember to keep speaking in the third person, because I do kind of want to just talk. But there's something about how has the something about how has the proliferation of legislation helped prevent hate crime? And I think that often during the last two that often during the last two decades, we were seeing increases and we would we would question whether those increases were a whether those increases were a product of increased hate crime or an increased awareness in the legislation that led people to report.

And I am aware in my generation, I am reluctant to report there's a part of me that thinks you had it come in, and you should probably take your tie off for that walk down that street. You brought it on yourself, and I don't want to waste police time. So there's a conditioning that goes on with minority communities, I think, and it takes some changing in how we think about these things to give communities permission to say, actually, you know, you didn't have that coming.

You do not deserve it. You have got the right to talk to the police about those incidents. So I welcome the increase. Nevertheless, I think there has been an overreliance on using some of these legislation for incidents that should not constitute a hate crime. What happens when those cases are brought, when those complaints are made? How they are investigated absolutely requires examination and thought. I do not think that justifies the whole scale. Removal of hate crime legislation. I believe that is a disproportionate response to the problem.

I think that has been identified.
16:02
Lord Young of Acton Portrait Lord Young of Acton (Conservative)
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My Lords, I rise to support the amendment of my noble friend and amendment of my noble friend and the noble Lady Baroness Fox of Buckley, and I should declare my interest as a director of the Free interest as a director of the Free Speech Union. I want to make three arguments against the statutory arguments against the statutory hate crime regime, against embedding the concept of hate crime embedding the concept of hate crime in British law. Crime is inextricably bound up with protected characteristics.

A hate crime is either the stirring up of hatred against the bearers of certain protected characteristics, or it's a crime that becomes a hate crime because the perpetrator is motivated by hostility towards one or more of the protected characteristics of the victim. But, my Lords, the number of protected characteristics in different laws in this statutory framework vary from law to law and hate crime law, on the face of it, is, for that reason a little bit confusing and incoherent.

So there are three protected characteristics referenced in the stirring up offences in the Public Order Act. There are five referenced in the Aggravated Offences regime, seven in the Hate Crime and Public Order Scotland Act and nine in the Equality Act. How can we rationalize this anomaly? Well, the solution of successive governments has been to constantly add new protected characteristics to the statute book. And I dare say that in due course, it's possible that amendments will be made to the Crime and Policing Bill, adding yet more protected characteristics to the criminal law.

The direction of travel, my Lords, is clear. The number of protected characteristics is constantly expanding, and various lobby groups are constantly petitioning parliamentarians to add ever more protected characteristics to the statute books. The end point of this process will be that every characteristic is protected. But, my Lords, if every characteristic is protected, then no particular characteristic will enjoy special protection. So we will, in effect be back to where we started pre 1965, before the concept of hate crime raised its head in British law.

So my Lords, my first argument is in the interests of saving us all a great deal of time and effort. Can we not just short circuit the process of getting to the point when every characteristic is protected by just stripping out the concept of hate crime and protected characteristics from British law, and returning to the pre 1965 status quo? The second argument I want to make is an argument that's already been touched upon by the noble Lady, Baroness Buckley, which is that the concept of hate crime is at odds with the sacrosanct principle of equality before the law.

Why should bearers of protected characteristics enjoy more robust legal protections than non bearers? Why is a criminal offence motivated by hostility towards a victim's transgender identity? Why is that offence punished more severely than exactly the same crime, but motivated towards the victim's sex? So sex, my Lords, is not a protected characteristic apart from in the Equality Act. I think this two tiered justice, this sense that some people, because they happen to belong to protected groups, enjoy additional legal protections than others, fosters grievance, breeds resentment and undermines public trust in the law and in the police in particular.

In 1981, around 87% of Britain's reported having confidence in the police. By 2022, that had fallen to about 67%, a substantial long term decline. And I would suggest that one of the reasons for declining public trust in the police is this sense that some groups are better protected than others because of the hate crime protected characteristic regime. My third argument, I think probably the strongest argument is that the aggravated offences regime introduces the concept of thought crime into British law, and I think we need to distinguish between mens rea and taking the particular thought someone is having towards the victim whilst committing a particular crime.

I don't think when assessing the seriousness of an offence, you could exclude motive. It would be absurd not to take motive into account, but that's different from punishing a crime more severely. If a person is experiencing a particular emotion, hostility, hatred about a particular group that the victim of the crime belongs to. Mens rea is universal and doesn't discriminate. Hate crime does. It? Says. If you're having particular thoughts about the victim when you commit the crime, not hatred in general.

I think this is an important point. Not hatred in general, but hatred based on their possession of one or more protected characteristics. Then you should be punished more severely. Not only is this criminalisation of certain thoughts, a hallmark of a totalitarian society, it's also, as my noble friend Lord Moynihan pointed out, it's also very hard to prove, very hard for a court to determine whether the person committing the crime accused of the crime had the verboten thoughts while committing the crime.

To paraphrase Queen Elizabeth the First, we cannot open a window and see into men's souls. My Lord, I'm perfectly aware that an amendment stripping the concept of hate crime from British law has little chance of winning a division in this House. So let me close with some more modest proposals. Don't add any more protected characteristics to the list of aggravators. Extend 29 J. 29 J is a section in the Public Order Act which protects various forms of criticism of religion and means it makes it more difficult for people to be prosecuted for stirring up religious hatred.

You can criticise a religion even quite robustly, thanks to 29 J, and not be prosecuted for stirring up religious hatred. And I think one useful improvement to the hate crime statutory regime would be to extend 29 J to the other, stirring up offences too. So, for instance, one example, the Free Speech Union, paid for the legal defence of a former Royal Marine called Jamie Michael. He robustly criticised illegal immigrants in a Facebook video and as a consequence, he was prosecuted for intending to stir up racial hatred.

It took a jury in Merthyr Tydfil all of 17 minutes to unanimously acquit him of that particular offence. He should never have been prosecuted, but we need a protection in the Public Order Act whereby if you make robust criticisms of even legal migration, you should not be vulnerable to a charge of stirring up racial hatred. And finally, an anomaly in the stirring up offences is that you can be prosecuted for stirring up racial hatred. If the effect of your words is likely to.

If your behaviour is likely to stir up racial hatred, even if that's not your intention. Whereas you can only be prosecuted for stirring up religious hatred or hatred on the basis of sexual orientation. If you intended to do that, that is an anomaly, and my recommendation would be that there is a two limb test that has to be satisfied before one of the stirring up offences can be made out. I think it should be incumbent upon the Crown to successfully prosecute someone to show not only that what they were saying, what they did, was likely to stir up hatred against the protected group in question, but that they intended to as well.

That would bring British law to a certain extent, into line with the Brandenburg Test in the US First Amendment, whereby you can only be prosecuted if your words, your actions, are not only likely to but were intended to cause imminent lawless action. So accepting that this controversial proposal, which my two colleagues have bravely made, is unlikely to ever win enough support in this House as presently constituted to win a division. Can I please urge the House to consider those more modest reforms as well? Thank you.

OK. Yeah.
16:12
Baroness Brinton Portrait Baroness Brinton (Liberal Democrat)
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I'm grateful for Lord Moynihan of Chelsea setting out his of Chelsea setting out his arguments for abolishing hate crimes. And I want to start here because he started with the issue of freedom of speech again, which I actually understand is where where he and those supporting him are coming from. Interestingly, he cited the case of Lucy Connolly, and I thought it might be helpful for the House just to remind ourselves of part of article ten of our Human Rights Act 1998, which says everyone has the right to freedom of expression, which we're short handing to speech.

But it goes on to say the exercise of these freedoms, since it carries with it duties and responsibilities, may be subject to such formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national security, territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention of disorder of crime or the protection of health or morals, for the protection of the reputation or rights of others. For preventing the disclosure of information received in confidence, or for maintaining the authority and impartiality of the judiciary.

I've carefully quoted all of it, although I'm going to be focusing on the part that relates to what she was actually convicted for, because I think here the problem is comes back to the debate we had in the previous group. There was a lot of concern about big figureheads cases when actually the law, the judge, the jury convicted, actually there wasn't a jury was there because she pleaded guilty, were very, very clear that she had was inciting racial hatred.

She pleaded guilty of saying threatening and abusive material, which is interesting given what we debated in the last group. She said, quote, set fire to all the effing hotels full of the bastards at exactly the time that people were on the streets, some of whom were trying to set fire to the hotels, and the tweet was viewed 310,000 times before it was deleted. And the judge specifically quoted that, let me finish my sentence. If in his summary at the end of the case I give way.



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I thank the noble Lady for accepting my intervention. I just wanted to point out that you didn't wanted to point out that you didn't quote Lucy Connolly's tweet in full. She added the caveat for all I care, She added the caveat for all I care, which suggested not that she was intending to encourage people to burn down asylum hotels, but that burn down asylum hotels, but that she was indifferent as to whether they did or not. For all I care.

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they did or not. For all I care. Unfortunately, the judge took a different view and I think we have to accept that it was seen by people who felt that could have felt, felt I wasn't the judge. I don't know what what his thoughts were, but it was clear it was seen enough time times by the public at the moment that a small number of people were causing real concern outside hotels, which had asylum seekers in them, which were absolutely nothing to do with the Southport stabbing.

That was the issue and therefore sorry in. Therefore, I believe that this is exactly where the balance of rights

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and responsibility coming back to John Stuart Mill, where we started in the previous week, I give way. I thank the noble Lady for

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I thank the noble Lady for letting me intervene. Will the noble Baroness agree with me that noble Baroness agree with me that it is unfortunate that there is a general perception that this lady, upon whose case I do not rest any of my argument, and and I discuss of my argument, and and I discuss that in my 40 page submission to the noble Lord McDonald's review. I place no reliance on that case, but will she not accept that there's a general perception and unfortunate perception that she was inveigled into pleading guilty by being kept on remand in a case where it would not have been usual to keep such a person with such an alleged crime on remand, and that she pled guilty because she thought that she would be released early.

More fool her, it turns out, and that as a result of her therefore pleading guilty, the matter that my noble friend Lord young refers to, which is that she said, for all I care, which may have turned out to be an excuse that would have led to her exoneration in front of a jury, much as that 17 minute jury decision that my noble friend mentioned, that it's unfortunate that that was never litigated so that we could discover what the law said.

As to whether, in fact, her tweet did reach the standards for criminal conviction, does she not think that unfortunate?

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I do not think it is unfortunate, given that the judge said 310,000 views of that tweet happened at a time when there was discord on the streets. And my argument is not about her particular case. It is back to article ten of the Human Rights Act, which says, along with freedom of expression, freedom of freedom of expression, freedom of speech, there are rights and responsibilities, and it is the role of the state to have laws to protect people.

It cannot have been right to think that even only one person, having seen that, started one of the arsons in the bins outside one of the asylum seeking hotels, don't know whether it happened, but the point is 310,000 people saw it. And that is the difference between her last phrase, which also probably most people didn't see. It was literally the phrase because they didn't take it in the way that that the noble Lord has indicated. He raised his eyebrows at me.

But, you know, if there are different ways, I don't want to get into the detail of that. I am trying to make the argument that for every freedom of speech by an individual, there are quite often consequences that may or may not end up as a crime as well. And that brings me back to the point that Lady Hunt raised earlier. The level of hate crimes is increasing. We also know that hate crimes are seriously underreported. The police say that those reported.



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I do apologise for intervening again. Does the noble Baroness not again. Does the noble Baroness not accept that had that matter been litigated, it would not have been before the judge. It would not have before the judge. It would not have been the judge. For the judge to rule, it would have been before a jury, which is something that we in jury, which is something that we in this country enjoy, that unfortunately, they're moves to suppress. It would have been in front of a jury, and a jury would have been able to decide whether

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that final point did, in fact justify her exoneration. Lord said he did not rely on Lucy Connolly in his earlier Lucy Connolly in his earlier argument. He is now trying to rely on it here. I am trying to make the point that it is more complex than point that it is more complex than he made out in his earlier contribution. I would like to make contribution. I would like to make some progress, if I may, here the last government's LGBT survey in last government's LGBT survey in 2018 showed that fewer than 1 in 10 LGBT people reported hate crimes or incidents.

And I think lady Hunters explained one of the reasons for that. The other reason I know from friends who have also been experiencing this sort of hate crime, is they don't believe that the police will do anything. And I think, Lord young, that is one of the reasons actually why there is a concern about the police, because often, too often people who are targeted in this way feel that they don't get the help that they need. As has been described earlier, there isn't a single piece of hate crime legislation.

It does include aggravated assault, which Lord young was particularly concerned about because actually, the point about hate crime is that it isn't just the individual. The protected characteristic means that they and their community are also affected by it. And we have spent many, many hours in this bill in previous groups discussing the absolute abhorrence of anti-Semitism. And we know that if actions in Israel can cause people in the UK to start attacking members of our Jewish community, either verbally or in person or their property, that is absolutely unacceptable.

And it's one of the reasons I would never want hate crimes to be removed. Research by professor Mark Walters of Sussex University shows that hate crime don't just affect those individuals targeted. He describes it as a ripple effect through their wider communities, so some people will avoid certain routes and places and others will not leave home at all, particularly in our Jewish community at the moment. But the same is true in certain areas for our Muslim communities. I just want to end by saying that if laws are weakened or repealed about hate crime, it would send an appalling message to these communities of faith, as well as LGBT and disabled people to do.

The movers of the amendment really no longer regarded as important that the state recognises the communities that have protected characteristics, their vulnerability as warranting criminalisation.
16:22
Lord Davies of Gower Portrait Lord Davies of Gower (Conservative)
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Once again, this has been a very interesting debate and I thank all noble Lords that have taken part in it, and I particularly thank my it, and I particularly thank my noble friend Lord Moynihan of Chelsea for tabling amendment 382 G. This amendment contains a line of argument that the committee began to consider in the last group, namely, whether the criminal law should concern itself with what people do or whether it should also punish what people are thought to feel or believe.

The provisions targeted by this amendment fall broadly into two categories. First, there are ordinary criminal offences assault, criminal damage, harassment and public order offences where existing penalties are increased. If the court concludes that the offender was motivated by hostility towards a protected characteristic. Secondly, there are freestanding offences, particularly under the Public Order Act 1986 and the Crime and Disorder Act 1998, which criminalised the stirring up of hatred even where no violence or other recognized criminal harm has occurred.

The crux of the debate comes down to this two identical acts can result in radically different sentences, depending not on the harm caused, but on an inferred state of mind, and that inference might be drawn from sparse or ambiguous evidence. Yet it carries profound consequences for liberty. This could make prosecutions more complex, investigations longer and outcomes less predictable. Hardly perhaps a recipe for clarity or fairness. These laws have grown incrementally and unevenly. They overlap. Divergent sometimes contradict one another.

The result is a body of legislation that is difficult to understand, inconsistently applied, and increasingly divorced from public confidence, and this amendment offers the committee an opportunity to step back and ask whether this approach has genuinely improved justice, or whether it has instead distracted our criminal justice system from its core task of tackling real and harmful crime. And this is a point I would particularly like to emphasise as a indeed, as a former police officer myself, I understand the difficulties in enforcing laws passed by well-meaning Parliament that are incoherent and ill thought through.

And part of this problem does indeed lie with us, the lawmakers. I think successive governments and parliaments have not taken a coherent approach to the public order and speech legislation. They have passed statute after statute, simply adding to the already long list of different offences, not thinking to consolidate or repeal existing laws. Now the Public Order Act 1986 went past, contains seven offences of this nature, and the last Labour government passed the Crime and Disorder Act 1998, of which sections 28 to 33 created racially aggravated offences.

They then passed the Racial and Religious Hatred Act of 2006, which added a new part three to the 1986 act, and then the Criminal Justice and Immigration Act of 2008, which added hatred on the grounds of sexual orientation to the list of hate crimes and the Sentencing Act of 2020 also permits for any offence to be aggravated by hostility expressed towards any of five characteristics, and this government is going down the same path as we have already discussed in Committee clauses 106 107 of this very Bill contain further provisions criminalising the use of offensive language based on racial hatred aimed towards an emergency worker, and if the government thinks it is coherent, to simply bolt on new offences to the already vast array of legislation, then I would respectfully suggest that they are somewhat misguided.

Furthermore, far from promoting cohesion, these provisions have too often deepened division. It has encouraged grievance politics and fostered public mistrust. It has also placed the police in an impossible position, asking them to arbitrate not just behaviour, but belief and expression. And this is a further concern, my Lords, about effectiveness. These Lords, as my noble friend Lord Moynihan of Chelsea mentioned, are clogging the justice system with cases that pose no real threat to public safety while doing little to address genuine hatred or violence.

And at the same time, they have fed a broader culture in which accusations of hate are used to silence debate, discourage inquiry and deter people. Artists, teachers, academics and ordinary citizens from speaking openly. So freedom of speech is not an abstract luxury. It is a defining feature of our national character and a cornerstone of democratic legitimacy. So I thank my noble friend for enabling this fruitful debate and hope the government will consider them carefully.

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Before my learned friend the Minister stands up, I'd be grateful if I could briefly intervene that if I could briefly intervene that at Second Reading I counted 44 previous statutes which were being amended in this bill. I just amended in this bill. I just counted five in amendment 382. Gee, I don't know whether they join the I don't know whether they join the 44 previous statutes in the bill itself or whether they stand alone. But this bill is extremely complex, and it's the word I used in Second Reading.

It is, in this sense, a
16:27
16:28
Lord Hanson of Flint Portrait Lord Hanson of Flint, The Minister of State, Home Department (Labour)
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Lord has brought forward his amendments. Having said that, I amendments. Having said that, I stand with the noble Lady, Baroness Hunt of Bethnal Green, and I stand with the noble Lady, Baroness with the noble Lady, Baroness Brinton, in saying that I can't accept those amendments and would accept those amendments and would not wish to accept those amendments because hate crime legislation exists because offences motivated by prejudice inflict harm on victims and on entire communities. These crimes target people for who they are, undermining social cohesion and spreading fear.

And it is my view generally that repeal would send not just the wrong signal, but it would say that identity based hostility is no more serious an offence than any other offence. And I'm afraid it isn't. Our laws rightly recognise the heightened impact and ensure justice outcomes reflect that gravity and hate crime laws, both, in my view, deter abuse. Despite the fact that the noble Lord and others have mentioned and prayed in aid figures that have risen. But they deter abuse, they uphold shared values of society they provide.

And I think the noble Lady Baroness made a very good point on this, a measure of the awareness and of the potential for those offences. And ultimately they protect victims with protected characteristics that are characteristics that they have and they cannot change. That's really important to remember that being attacked or. Preyed against in many ways to characteristics that they cannot change. Now, let's be clear on this, because the noble Lord has has been measured and is clear. But this would remove offences of stirring up racial hatred.

It would abolish.

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I'm so sorry. It took me a few seconds to react to what the Minister said because I had to Minister said because I had to think about what he'd said, but I think it would be fair for the information of the House to information of the House to recognise that there are several of the nine protected characteristics which are not immutable and are which are not immutable and are capable of change. I give you one example is gender identity, another is marriage and civil partnership.

And so so I think let's be clear, there are some that are immutable, but others that are capable of change. And one of the problems with I'm not having I'm not expressing the opinion on on this particular clause, but in general, I think it is fair to say that protected characteristics themselves socially evolve and develop over time.

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Well, let the what the noble Lady has said stand. I am making Lady has said stand. I am making the point that disability, transgender identity in my view, transgender identity in my view, sexual orientation, race are things that you that you have and are part that you that you have and are part of you. And if the offences that are being proposed for removal are being proposed for removal today are removed by this house, then what that means is that that sends a signal to society that we're happy for people to stir up that hatred on the grounds of those characteristics.

And that's not acceptable to me. I'm afraid it's not acceptable to me, and I, I can't accept those amendments today, and I accept the way in which they've been put in a moment. But I can't accept them. And I hope he he

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recognises that. I thank the Minister for giving

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I thank the Minister for giving way. Surely the signal scrapping hate crime from British law would hate crime from British law would send is not that we don't care about vulnerable, vulnerable groups, it's that we think they should it's that we think they should enjoy the same legal protections as everyone else. And everyone should be equal in the eyes of the law.

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But that is a view. It is not a view. I share the reason that there are protections in the Public Order Act 1986 on stirring up hatred on racial religious grounds is because, racial religious grounds is because, yes, I'm equal in the law if I have that hatred against me. But possibly that hatred is being possibly that hatred is being generated because I happen to have a racial or religious characteristic which is subject characteristic which is subject therefore, to attack.

So we're not equal under the law, because if I didn't have that racial and religious hatred, I would not have been attacked. So therefore, for me that is an aggravating factor. And therefore for me, that is a reason why we should maintain those offences. And let me just go back to what I was saying a moment ago. This would remove offences stirring up hatred under the Racial and Religious Hatred Act. This would abolish racially and religiously aggravated offences under the crime and disorder. It would delete aggravating factors of race, religion, sexual orientation, disability, transgender identity from the sentencing code at the very time when people who are Jewish are being attacked for being Jewish, at the very time when people who are transgender are being attacked for being transgender.

I'm sorry, that is not acceptable. Now, again, this is not to say that I, the noble Lord, wishes to encourage your support, that type of activity. And I recognise in the measured way that they put that that they don't. They have an honestly held opinion that removing that legislation would be a benefit to society. I happen to disagree, and I'm trying to put that reason why. And if there is clear water between us on that, that is the nature of political life.

And I'm not impugning any other characteristics on the noble Lord for for bringing this measure forward. But I simply say to him, the effect of this would be to compromise the ability of the courts to reflect the greater harm. The point that the noble Baroness Hunter, Bethnal Green, put it, would undermine deterrence. It would undermine clarity for police, it would undermine clarity for prosecutors. It would signal that those crimes are no more serious when they're motivated by hostility towards protected characteristics, contrary to long standing principle.

And it would risk eroding public confidence, particularly amongst those people who have those protected characteristics and the under-reporting that the noble Baroness mentioned would nosedive, in my view, absolutely nosedive if the provisions were taken away, because people would think that society hasn't put that down as a benchmark by which people should be judged. And therefore, I'm afraid to the noble Lord today, I can't accept them, and I'm afraid I must just give notice to the noble Lord Young of Acton.

He made a very helpful plea that we should not bring forward further protective characteristics. I regret to inform him that at Report stage, I will be very proud to stand here and move an amendment which puts transgender and disability as a protected characteristic, in line with the manifesto on which my party stood and won an election in July of 2024. And we will be bringing forward an amendment to the Crime and Policing Bill joining stage to give effect to this change.

And I shall be very proud to stand here and move it. And we can have that debate open and honestly. But I just say to the committee of this House society has some basic principles of respect that it should enshrine in law and the legislation that the noble Lord is seeking to remove today would undermine that principle, and I will not support it.

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Before the noble Lord sits down. And I've listened to this debate in the previous one on the previous amendment carefully without amendment carefully without intervening. But I'm slightly surprised I have a lot of sympathy surprised I have a lot of sympathy with the noble Lord, as he knows on on many of the amendments in this, on many of the amendments in this, in this act, in, in this proposed bill. But I'm a little surprised as bill. But I'm a little surprised as his unequivocal rejection of, of several of these kind of amendments, only because we have the McDonnell review going on and will he accept that if it comes up with recommendations, while this bill is not yet in Act, that he will accept

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amendments to take on board those recommendations? Well, first of all, let me say

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Well, first of all, let me say two things in response to that. One, we've commissioned McDonnell to look at review of protests. Lord MacDonald of River Glaven, to look at review of protests. And we've commissioned him to look at a range commissioned him to look at a range of matters to do with that legislation. But I think the noble Lord, and this is where I accept Lord, and this is where I accept what the lady has said. We will have to look at what the noble Lord MacDonald brings forward.

Government has to take political decisions, whether we accept that. But the principle I'm defending here today is that the noble Lord will be looking at potentially issues around implementation tweaks, etc. but the noble Lord Moynihan of Chelsea is a complete, well measured assault on those legislation tenants in the very first place. And I cannot ever say this government accepting the removal of those legislative tenants, but we will always accept with the recommendations that are being looked at.

Going back to the point, the noble Lady, Baroness Hunter, Bethnal Green, mentioned, how do we better improve the monitoring, policing, understanding of those issues? And it is a complex area which and as the noble Lady I know through her experience in her recent appointments, but we will also be bringing forward the fence for transgender and disability at Report stage, because that's what we seek to do in terms of our manifesto commitment. But that's another complex area, which is why it's taken time for us to get to the stage of bringing forward the amendment.

And when we do so, we'll have to look at that in the context of the whole package that the noble Lady has worked on, that this House and Committee is looking at now, and in which the noble Lord has made his comments. But I simply put from this Dispatch Box today that I can't accept this amendment. I think he would know that before he introduced them. The noble Lord Young of Ashton hinted as such when he spoke in his contribution. But I asked the noble Lord today to withdraw them, and if he revisits the report, we'll have that discussion again in a fair and open, measured way, as we have today.



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All my learned friend the Minister sits down. Can I ask him Minister sits down. Can I ask him one important question? I understand that the McDonnell understand that the McDonnell report is going to be made before report. Will my noble friend, the Minister agree that that should be Minister agree that that should be made available to us before we settle into a report? Well.

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settle into a report? Well. The noble Lord MacDonald of River Glen is expecting to produce a report at some point during the next couple of months. I can't give a definitive time on that, but I will say to the House that we will examine and make sure that it's obviously published. There's likely to be, I anticipate, statements, or if there wasn't, there would be an urgent question in this House on that report. And we will look at how we, first of all, as a government, consider the recommendations.

Secondly, if we need legislation, what mechanism that is and when that brings that forward. So I give my noble friend that there will be full discussion on the Lord MacDonald report when it comes. What I can't do as yet is constrain the discussion from Lord MacDonald's perspective by giving the answers to the questions the noble Lord, noble friend has posed today.

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Well, my Lords, I thought that also was a great debate. And and I also was a great debate. And and I thought that the noble Minister, noble Lord Hanson of Flint, did noble Lord Hanson of Flint, did manage to articulate very clearly that there is a clear space, clear that there is a clear space, clear water between two opposing groups of thoughts on these matters. And I of thoughts on these matters. And I I'm I'm gagging to launch into a half hour speech to attempt to respond to both what he and others said.

But I'm very mindful of the noble Lord. Katz's admonitions
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16:42
Lord Davies of Gower Portrait Lord Davies of Gower (Conservative)
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My Lords, we now come to a group of amendments that seek to improve the government's legislation. As it the government's legislation. As it currently stands, we are in broad agreement of the need to expand the police's powers, search powers police's powers, search powers giving us the right, given the rise in shoplifting, not a term I particularly like as it is section one theft, but for the purposes of this debate I will refer to it as shoplifting, theft of personal property, and are only divergences to the extent which we should extend these new powers.

My Lords, the measures in this bill are extremely necessary. We are facing an epidemic of petty theft, with phone theft and shoplifting reaching highs. A third of adults were victims of theft last year, with the United Kingdom accounting for roughly 40% of all such thefts in Europe. These phones are then dismantled, deactivated and often sent abroad with little chance of their owners getting them back. Shoplifting gangs are terrorising high streets. Theft from shops reached over £2.2 billion last year, narrowing the margins of small independent stores and pushing up costs for the law abiding public.

Electronic stores are often targeted, with ownership left, with ownerships left helpless by the lack of power bestowed upon security guards and high costs of surveillance laws. The police must have the means to tackle this crime, perhaps tackle this crime past their current capabilities. The fact that once a criminal enters a premises, he is able to store the stolen goods until the search warrant is issued, is not justice. It is an affront to the victim. It is not good enough to have to hope that officers arrive in time to arrest criminals in public.

For individuals to have a chance of retrieving their stolen goods, officers must be able to enter premises without a warrant is the stipulation. If the if the stipulation situation requires it. That is why the government's measure is a welcome step. However, they have watered down the measures that we propose in the 2023 Criminal Justice Bill, whereas our measures would have allowed specified officers to search for stolen goods without a warrant if it is not practicable to obtain one. The government have limited this to goods with obtainable electronic tracking data.

The amendments my name and the names of my noble friend Lord Cameron of Lochiel and my noble friend Lord Keane. Keane of Ellie, attempt to revert this measure back to its original intent, so that it does not solely pertain to electronically tracked goods. While there are several problems with the policy that relies on goods being electronically tackled tracked, the first of which is evident, not all stolen goods are electronic and therefore have tracking data. Even if the goods in question are electronic, it does not necessarily follow that they will be trackable, and in requiring this condition, the government is narrowing the scope of investigation, investigating stolen goods to a considerable degree.

Secondly, criminals are enterprising even if goods are electronically trackable, individuals and gangs who make livings from stealing them will have ways to bypass this technology. Whereas whether it be as basic as wrapping aluminium foil around phones or possessing technology that prevents items being trackable, the. There are a plethora of ways to hide previously trackable data that would disqualify stolen items under the bill as it stands. And finally, my Lords, 42% of all UK phone thefts occur in the capital, and by virtue of population density, most phone thefts and shoplifting incidents will take place in dense, built up cities.

Crime rates are often exacerbated by economic status, meaning offenders will often live and reside in social housing, and the result is that if a stolen device is electronically tracked, its location often traces to a high rise apartment block or the like residence, making it incredibly hard to pinpoint a specific apartment. Police forces cannot be expected to trawl through every residence in a block until they are certain they have the right one, and the byproduct of adding an electronic tracking condition would be that policemen will inadvertently enter residences unlawfully that don't actually contain the stolen goods, or, more likely, they wont investigate these crimes at all.

It is an unnecessary trade off, my Lords, by coveting this sensible policy with a stringent tracking requirement, the government will pass into law legislation that favours not victim but criminal, and it will place constraints upon the police and force the public to change their behaviour so as to make untraceable property trackable. This will cost time and money. Criminals will still have the safety of their own residence for the large proportion of thefts, free to dismantle and sell on stolen goods until our overburdened court system issues a warrant, there is an easy solution.

Remove the electronic tracking requirement. Allow senior officers to use discretion. They are trained to have to decide whether a search is warranted. So the conservatives and the government have the same aim. And so I hope that the Minister will understand why we believe that our measures will improve effectiveness in tackling theft. And I very much look forward

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to hearing his reply. But for now, my Lords, I beg to move. Amendment proposed clause 128,

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Amendment proposed clause 128, page 154. Line 12 leave out electronic contract.

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My Lords, this group addresses the extension of warrantless search powers for electronically tracked powers for electronically tracked stolen goods to the service police. Clause 129 alongside civilian police. Clause 128. Now, my Lords, police. Clause 128. Now, my Lords, whilst we recognise the need for police to tackle high tech crime, such sweeping powers, particularly warrantless searches, must be meticulously governed to avoid abuse and uphold civil liberties. So, my Lords, I have tabled amendments three eight, 6387388 and 389, which would ensure robust governance and accountability mechanisms are embedded in these provisions.

As regards amendment 386, my Lords, this requires the Secretary of State to produce a code of practice for the operation of clause 129, specifically mandating consultation with civil liberties and human rights organisations and and relevant service police bodies. This would ensure due process regarding authorisation, seizure, retention and disposal of evidence. Amendment 388 would require the Secretary of State to provide appropriate training for service police personnel on how to exercise these powers proportionately and lawfully. Amendment 387 mandates the establishment of an independent mechanism for handling, investigating, and reviewing public complaints arising from the exercise of these powers, giving complainants similar statutory rights as victims.

Reporting to the Independent Office for Police Conduct Amendment three, 89 mandates that the Secretary of State produces an annual report detailing the exercise of these warrantless search powers under clause 128, ensuring transparency and accountability to Parliament. Furthermore, these new obligations require affirmative procedure for their governing regulations, ensuring full parliamentary debate before they are enacted as sought in amendments 499 500 and 501. My Lords, on these benches we are opposed to Lord Davis's amendments three, eight, 3384 and 385, which seek to remove the requirement, as we've heard from the Labour.

Lord Davis, for an officer to even possess electronic tracking data before conducting a warrantless search by stripping away this technologically justified threshold, these amendments would transform a specific investigative tool into an arbitrary power of entry, undermining the core principle that that amount a person's home is his castle, my Lords. In contrast, amendments three, eight, 6 to 3, eight, nine provide the necessary basis for these intrusive powers to be to be overseen, my Lord. Specifically, amendment 386 mandates a statutory code of practice for the armed forces to ensure their exercise of these powers is necessary, proportionate and strictly compliant with the Human Rights Act.

And furthermore, amendment 387 establishes an independent mechanism for handling public complaints, ensuring that any misuse of power is investigated by a body demonstrably independent of the service police. Finally, my Lords, my amendments require post-implementation reporting to Parliament every 12 months. We must see the data on the demographic profile of those targeted and the subsequent criminal justice outcomes to guard against disproportionate application or mission creep. Without these safeguards, we risk creating a shortcut, again, as other provisions might do, to a surveillance state where convenience is prioritised over constitutional protection.

My Lords, the safeguards I have proposed in amendment 386 through 389 regarding service, police are only as strong as the parliamentary scrutiny that would underpin them. My Lords, we must ensure that these powers are exercised not just with efficiency, but with a regular check of

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parliamentary accountability. My Lords, this group of amendments addresses clauses 1 to 8 amendments addresses clauses 1 to 8 and 1 to 9 of the Bill, which will grant new powers to the police to enter premises in order to search enter premises in order to search for and seize stolen items which can be electronically tracked there without the need to first apply to without the need to first apply to a court for a warrant. And I would like to start by welcoming the like to start by welcoming the welcome given to these new clauses given to given by the noble Lord, Lord Davis, on behalf of the the opposition.

These are. These new powers are intended, as he said, to be exercised where a stolen item is electronically tracked to a specific location. And this, my Lords, is in a direct response to public concern that the police are not able to act swiftly in response to crimes like mobile phone theft, where even when victims have clear real time electronic evidence of the phone's location, it will reduce the risk that stolen goods are quickly moved on or used to facilitate other crime. And I would suggest to your Lordships House that it is obviously the main reason for benefit of the of these clauses is, is to ensure that mobile phone theft is, is, is addressed and and combated.

But I would also suggest because actually, sadly not in this place any longer, but the noble Lord, Lord Moynihan of Chelsea, speaking to an earlier group, suggested that the there's a there's an impression that the police don't prioritise phones. Criminal behaviour like mobile phone theft and instead concentrate on on, on, on, on on other issues, which I won't go into, I would suggest that the police being able to more quickly, effectively tackle, tackle very, very common criminal behaviour like mobile phone theft would also very much enhance the reputation of of the police that that we that we know as noble Lord, Lord Moynihan of Chelsea said, you know, it's it's sometimes at risk of being downplayed.

I'll first address the amendments put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Davis of Gower. Amendments 383385 would remove the requirement within clause 1 to 8 that the power may only be exercised by police in relation to stolen goods that are electronically tracked to specific
16:54
Lord Katz Portrait Lord Katz (Labour)
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specified premises. They would also remove the condition that, before the use of power is authorised by a senior police officer, he or she senior police officer, he or she must be satisfied that there is electronic tracking data linking the stolen item and the specific the stolen item and the specific premises. These amendments would significantly broaden the scope of the proposed powers and remove the proposed powers and remove important safeguards. Points are. Powers of entry. My Lords are Powers of entry. My Lords are inherently intrusive, and there is a balance to be struck between ensuring the police can act quickly and decisively against thieves and retrieval of victims stolen property, while safeguarding the right to to a private and family life.

And I think the noble Lord, Lord Clement Jones, put it very well when he said when he referred to as a technically justified threat threshold, it I think I would I would contend to your Lordships House that that people would generally accept the need for warrants to be used in, in, in terms of addressing. Detection of stolen goods. But when you have a device that you can track electronically in real time and the police turn up and say, well, we can't do anything about this because we have to go and get a warrant to and you can point to the address where you have known that phone has gone to.

And you also know that there's a very good chance that if the police do not act quickly, that phone will be moved on out of the country, then I think it's only right that we use that as a, as as as as as, as an appetite threshold to introduce these, to introduce these powers, rather than saying it should happen to any for any stolen goods or whatever nature, that where there isn't tracking data involved, it is an electronic involved, I think in terms of certainly in terms of of confidence of the police to catch up with the the 21st century and current technology.

I think it will do much to improve it, but we don't see the need to go to go further. The the requirement for electronic tracking data linking at least one stolen premises before powers can be exercised provides this further layer of reliability in their use whilst ensuring, as I said, the police can act swiftly when they need to. And I would just say again, removing these requirements would dilute the safeguards that are intended to ensure police officers use these powers lawfully, proportionately and only within specific circumstances.

Which brings me neatly on to amendments three, eight, 6 to 3, eight, nine were tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Clement Jones, and I certainly commend the noble Lords intent to ensure that there are strong there, strong accountability, independent oversight, and scrutiny of scrutiny of the use of these powers. As I've said, the government recognises that these powers are by their nature intrusive, particularly as they can be exercised by officers without them first needing to seek authorization from a court by obtaining a search warrant.

We have accordingly built in appropriate safeguards to ensure that the new powers are used appropriately and within well established, independent oversight and scrutiny mechanisms. Amendment 386 would require Secretary of State to issue a statutory code of practice, which the Service Police must have regard to when exercising the new powers. Let me stress the noble Lord, Lord Clement-jones, that these new powers will be subject to the relevant provisions within the Police and Criminal Evidence Act, 1984 and its codes of practice. The government will amend Pace code B and code B of the Service Police Codes of Practice to reflect the new powers, providing clear and detailed guidance around their use for both territorial and service police.

These revisions to the codes will be completed before the powers are commenced. This will provide robust statutory guidance to police and will be completed by complemented rather by the College of Policing Authorised Professional Practice. Amendment 387 would require the creation of an independent oversight mechanism to investigate public complaints about the use of these powers by service, police, any any complaints about their use by territorial police would be addressed in the normal way through internal police complaints, procedures and referrals to the Independent Office for Police Conduct were required regarding the Service police, which is the focus of the noble Lords Amendment.

Any complaints would be dealt with under the complaint System for Service Police as set out in the service, Police Complaints etc. regulations 2023. This is overseen by the Service Police Complaints Commissioner, whose role is similar to that of the iOPC. The Commissioner is independent of the Service Police and the Mod, and has a statutory duty to secure, maintain and review arrangements for procedures that deal with complaints and conduct. They deal with the most serious complaints and set the standard by which service police should handle complaints.

The Service Police Complaints Commissioner has the same powers as the service police, where it has been determined they will carry out an investigation, and they can also determine that complaint can be yes, it can be reinvestigated if satisfied. There are compelling reasons to do so. Moving on. Amendment 38 will require service police to undertake training for they can exercise the new powers. All members, by law to the service police undergo training that addresses each element set out in the noble Lords Amendment, including the legal requirements and limitations of search and seizure powers, proportionality, maintenance and clear records, and compliance with article eight of the act and the Human Rights Act 1998.

Service. Police trainees are tested on arrest, entry, search and seizure where they can exercise these powers. Training is updated in response to any change in legislation that would affect service police officers exercise of their powers. Specifically, training will be updated in light of the new powers in this bill. Finally, amendment 39 would require the Secretary of State to make an annual report to Parliament of the police exercises of these new powers. Noble Lords will recognise that statutory powers are already subject to regular review and rigorous scrutiny.

The well established parliamentary arrangements enable members of both houses to examine the exercise of these and other statutory powers through written or oral questions, select committees or other means. Police accountability is ensured through a variety of statutory and non-statutory oversight and scrutiny mechanisms, including the Independent Office for Police conduct the Service Police.

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But he's getting to the end of what he has to say clearly. But what he has to say clearly. But what raised my eyebrows reading one section, clause 1 to 9 of the bill, section, clause 1 to 9 of the bill, is the fact that these powers have been given to the service police in the first place. I mean, what is the first place. I mean, what is the rationale for them having these powers in particular? I mean, how much mobile phone theft of the much mobile phone theft of the service police dealing with, and why are we putting them on all fours with the civilian police? I mean, the the noble, the Lord.

The Minister will have noticed that I haven't tried to amend clause 1 to 8. All my focus is on the service police. And certainly if a military policeman turned up on my doorstep, my Lords, and asked to check check out my house, I would be rather concerned, my Lords. Hence the need for safeguards. But there seems to be no rationale for why the service police are being brought into and

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being given these these pretty extensive powers by Lords. My Lords, the bad news is that

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My Lords, the bad news is that not all service personnel are absolute angels. It could be one junior soldier stealing a mobile phone from another junior soldier junior serviceman. I think these junior serviceman. I think these arrangements are very sensible, and I agree with everything that the noble Lord, the Minister, has had noble Lord, the Minister, has had to say. Only question for noble Lord, whilst I'm on my feet, is there any evidence that the service police do make mistakes in terms of the procedures when they're exercising their powers? Because

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I'm not aware of any problem. I'm going to go take last one first. I'm not sure there is any. first. I'm not sure there is any. I'm not sure there is any, any any evidence. I'd have to I'd have to evidence. I'd have to I'd have to look in look into that. But and to answer the noble Lord, Lord Clement-jones more substantive in intervention. Why service police need the powers to deal with electronically track stolen goods, electronically track stolen goods, whilst a service police deal with crime.

In the defence context, it's important that they're equipped to respond effectively to current and future trends in criminal behaviour. And obviously the provisions in this bill help ensure that service police can respond with lawful, fair and proportionate action both now and in the future, to the full spectrum of criminality that threatens the occasion and operational effectiveness of our new forces, sir, of our armed forces. So the these new powers will give officers more chance of finding retrieving stolen items that are electronically tracked premises quickly and reduce the risk they're lost or moved on.

Maybe put it down to an overabundance of caution, but also an acknowledgement that actually, you know, crimes that affect and and have to be investigated by civilian forces can also affect and investigated by, by armed forces.

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What I would say, my Lords, is that faced with an abundance of of that faced with an abundance of of caution i.e. if in doubt, make it give the police powers is not an approach that is particularly

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approach that is particularly favoured on the on these benches. A point, well, a point well made and well taken. I would just add and well taken. I would just add the powers would only, of course be exercised within the jurisdiction of the service police, so there wouldn't be service police suddenly moving into, in into areas of activity that you would expect the territorial police to be to be pursuing. However, the noble Lord, Lord Clement-jones, did anticipate that I was I was winding up, and I would hope that my comments have reassured the noble Lord that the spirit and intention behind his amendments have been incorporated within the proposals and the face of the Bill.

And so I, in the light of my remarks, I hope the noble Lord, Lord Davis, would withdraw

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his amendment. Lord, I give thanks to noble Lords who have taken part in this Lords who have taken part in this debate, and I will reiterate my opening speech by saying that I know we all have the same end goal know we all have the same end goal arresting criminals and preventing thefts. We may have different roads by which we believe to be the best by which we believe to be the best way of arriving at that goal, but I'm confident that this debate has taken place in a productive and taken place in a productive and open minded manner.

My Lords, at a risk of repeating myself, phone theft and shoplifting frequently targeted electronic stores is not just an epidemic, but a growing one. Crime is thriving, businesses are closing, and the public is becoming increasingly anxious. The phone is stolen every 7.5 minutes. In our capital city, we cannot simply look on at the situation with the hope that it gets better. My Lords Government must resolve to adopt a framework from our 2023 Bill, and they must now go further. Amendments 383384385.

My name. Achieve this, they remove the requirement that a stolen goods be electronically traceable and permit senior officers to use discretion to search premises without a warrant. Although these amendments answer a problem that requires immediate action, the government must get a grip on the theft epidemic. Our measures provide them with one of many necessary solutions, and I hope the noble Lord, the Minister, takes them away for consideration. My Lords, moving on to the amendments. In the name of the noble Lord, Lord Clement-jones, I largely agree with this principle that the new clause, the one that introduces new powers, should be accompanied by checks and balances, establishing a code of practice, having an independent mechanism for investigating complaints, providing mandatory training for senior officers, and requiring an annual report on the use of the powers in question.

All active safeguards to the heightened powers officers will gain. So I believe that this especially holds should the government incorporate our amendments. We trust the judgment of our officers and believe that they will always make the judgment they think best. But I am conscious that we are entrusting them with more intrusive powers. There must exist mechanisms that counteract any tendencies for this power to be misused, and I believe that the noble Lords amendments achieve that. However, my noble Lords, I must say for now I beg

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leave to withdraw the amendment. Lordships pleasure the amendment be withdrawn. The amendment is by be withdrawn. The amendment is by leave withdrawn. Amendments 384385. Lord Davis not moved. Not moved. Lord Davis not moved. Not moved. The question is to clause 128 stand part of the bill. As many as of that opinion will say content the that opinion will say content the contrary not content. The contents have it in clause 129. Amendment have it in clause 129. Amendment 386. Lord Clement-jones not moved.

The question is clause 129 stand part of the bill? As many as are of that opinion will say content the contrary not content. The contents have it after clause 129, amendment 387388 and 389. Lord Clement-jones not moved, turning over the page. The question is that amendments 130 and 131 en bloc stand part of the bill, as many as are fed opinion will say content the contrary, not content. I think the content. Content. Yes, I think the contents of it, albeit sotto voce in in clause 132, amendment 399, a Lord Hanson of fleet.
17:07
Lord Hanson of Flint Portrait Lord Hanson of Flint, The Minister of State, Home Department (Labour)
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My Lords, I beg to move the amendment standing in my name on the Marshalled List. These amendments build on clauses 130 to 1, three, seven, which confer 1, three, seven, which confer powers on law enforcement agencies to extract information from online accounts as part of their accounts as part of their investigations into immigration, crime, sexual abuse cases, and to protect national security and our borders. Taken together. Amendments 44 1 to 4 four four and 452, as well as amendments 393 and 394, ensure that the police can access information in online accounts for individuals subject to national civil orders.

These include terrorism and state threat prevention and mitigation measures, as well as youth diversion orders, which are being introduced in clauses earlier in this bill. It is increasingly common for individuals to store data in the cloud for various reasons to free up space on devices, and increasingly because of the way devices are. Applications are designed, but also regretfully, in some cases deliberately, to make it less accessible to law enforcement. This is particularly the case with young people, where operational experience from the police has shown that this cohort will regularly store data in online accounts, and this data can be critical in supporting law enforcement to manage terrorists and broader national security risks.

The increasing reliance on cloud data means the police are likely to have an increased need to access cloud data as part of compliance checks, where an individual's and this is the important thing for the committee, is subject to online restrictions as part of a civil order, such as the Youth Diversion Order. These amendments will provide a clear statutory basis for officers to access cloud data when conducting a compliance check for an individual. And again, this is the important point. Who is subject to either a youth diversion order or a terrorism or state threats, prevention or investigation measures.

Order the Police and Crime and Sentencing and Courts Act of 2022 contains provision allowing for the extraction of information from electronic devices in cases where the user has died, and amendment 392 will clarify that this power also applies now to online information. As long as the authorised person is satisfied that the power is proportionate and there is no other practical way of obtaining the information. And finally, amendments three, eight, nine 8 to 3 89F are small but important.

Drafting changes to clause 132. Clause 132. Before the committee identifies which senior officers may authorize the use of a power in clause 130, which provides for a general extraction power for law enforcement agencies to obtain online information. Currently, the table refers to naval, military, and force, but does not explicitly mention the police. I think noble Lords would wish the police to be mentioned, and therefore these amendments insert the term police after each of those references to correct the omission.

I hope that's clear to noble Lords and to the Committee, and it is in the specific circumstances, as I've outlined in my speech speech to date, and I hope that the noble Lords can accept the amendments at the appropriate time.

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The proposed clause 132, page 161, line 29, column two after Navy insert police.

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insert police. My Lords, this grouping deals with the complex landscape of remotely stored electronic data, or remotely stored electronic data, or what is commonly known as cloud access. Government amendments in access. Government amendments in this group, such as 393394 and 441, significantly expand the ability of
17:11
Lord Clement-Jones Portrait Lord Clement-Jones (Liberal Democrat)
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the state to inspect online accounts through seized devices, including the interception of including the interception of authentication codes. Now, my Lords, we acknowledge that as evidence shifts from hardware to the cloud, shifts from hardware to the cloud, the law must evolve. However, we remain deeply concerned by the widened scope for investigation, widened scope for investigation, which carries an inherent risk of excessive prying. These powers go excessive prying. These powers go beyond merely searching a phone. They allow law enforcement to walk through the digital doors of a person's entire life.

Their private communications, financial history, and medical records. And, as the Minister said, under clause 169, these intrusive inspections can now be included as conditions of a youth diversion order. While the government maintains these are necessary to identify harmful online activity early, we must ensure that they are used only when strictly necessary and proportionate to protect the public from serious harm. So I ask the Minister to clarify the oversight mechanisms for these powers. We cannot allow the inspection of a child's entire digital history to rest on a subjective belief, rather than a rigorous, objective assessment of risk.

The digital ecosystem must not be a safe haven for perpetrators, but neither can it become a borderless opportunity

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for state surveillance. I thank the Minister for tabling and setting out the rationale and setting out the rationale behind this group of government amendments. Amendments 393 and 394 amendments. Amendments 393 and 394 authorise the interception of certain communications in order to access online accounts. These access online accounts. These amendments represent an additional measure to youth diversion orders on top of the existing powers
17:12
Lord Davies of Gower Portrait Lord Davies of Gower (Conservative)
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on top of the existing powers provided to the authorities. Under the current drafting of the Bill. Lords public safety is and should be the first priority of any government. Youth diversion orders exist in order to curb and prevent young people from engaging in terrorist activity, or associating with those affiliated to terrorist groups that seek to radicalise children, and we are supportive of the measures in this bill to increase the scope and applicability. Applicability of youth diversion orders such as clause 167, which enables chief officers of police with the power to apply for Youth Diversion Order.

These are necessary and proportionate measures which should be implemented in order to mitigate terrorist risk. And we on these benches are equally supportive of the amendments in this group, which are aimed at ensuring that youth diversion orders are made. They contain the necessary provisions to enable authorities to carry out their operations as effectively as possible. I Lords, there is no point in making a youth diversion order if the provisions of that order do not sufficiently provide police with the ability to execute its objective.

Terrorists and extremist groups are increasingly turning to online forums and communities in order to identify individuals for radicalisation and spread misinformation. Therefore, where the courts deem it necessary to issue a youth diversion order, it is right that a provision of such an order can contain the inspection of any online account. Not only will this ensure that young people are kept safe from dangerous and hateful rhetoric, but it will also enable authorities to understand who is targeting children and their methods of radicalisation.

It is also important that the imperative to keep the public safe is counterbalanced with appropriate regard for individual liberty. Youth diversion orders contain a number of provisions which impact on people's daily lives. And so it is right only right that they sanction. They are sanctioned where it is considered strictly necessary, and I therefore seek assurances from the noble Lord, the Minister, that these amendments and youth diversion orders more generally are accompanied with the appropriate safeguards in place to mitigate against state overreach and the unnecessary deprivation of people's freedoms.

And, of course, rights to privacy.
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Lord Hanson of Flint Portrait Lord Hanson of Flint, The Minister of State, Home Department (Labour)
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Davies I hope I can answer the questions from the noble Lord, from the Liberal Democrat benches and the noble Lord from the opposition frontbench as well. And I think I can say to them that, as in the amendments that we brought forward amendments that we brought forward today, the measures in the amendments are only applying to the terrorism and state threat prevention investigation measures, as well as the new youth diversion orders. And there are safeguards in terms of what type of data the police are allowed to access.

For example, limitations on accessing information, which might include legally privileged material in a similar way to accessing local data on a device. Nothing in the legislation changes the existing duties on the police, imposed by the Data Protection Act of 2018, UK legislation offers important safeguards for law enforcement in terms of processing of that personal data, and that includes the requirement not to retain personal data longer than necessary. It also includes that the police may come across information that's directly not relevant to their investigation, and in such circumstances, the police aim to mitigate the risks of collateral intrusion on people's privacy, focusing on the information themselves.

And there will be a similar approach adopted for the measures that are put down in the amendment here today. We're also working with the police on plans to implement those new youth diversion orders, and the police will, as part of that, have their own operational procedures and the data protection impact assessments. And as I've said already, the legislation doesn't affect any existing duty on police forces that are a fundamental part of the Data Protection Act 2018. So I hope that that will help the noble Lord Clement-jones and the noble Lord Davis of Gower.

And again, this is just to remind the committee only in the specific cases of the two types of order youth diversion and effectively the tpim type order that we have under existing legislation. So it's a relatively small number, and I hope with those protections, the noble Lords can both allow the committee amendment to pass today.

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The question is that amendment 389A be agreed to as many as are that opinion will say content contrary not content. The contents have it amendments three, eight, have it amendments three, eight, nine, B, c, d, e and f. The question is that these amendments be agreed to en bloc. As many as be agreed to en bloc. As many as are of that opinion will say content the contrary, not content. content the contrary, not content. The contents have it. The question is that clause 132 stand part of the bill, as many as of that opinion content contrary not content.

The contents have it. The question is that amendments 133 and 134 stand part of the bill en bloc. As many as are of that opinion will say content the contrary, not content. The contents have it in clause 135, amendment 390. Lord Anderson of Ipswich. The group are designed to probe a.

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Proposed extension. Of counter-terrorism and national. Security powers. Usable national. Security powers. Usable only at ports, airports and places near the land border with Ireland near the land border with Ireland that are among the very strongest of all those powers vested in the police. I have consistently supported those powers. I controversial though they once were, and I support the extension of them to data on the cloud. By clause 137. The issue raised by these
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Lord Anderson of Ipswich Portrait Lord Anderson of Ipswich (Crossbench)
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amendments is whether those powers and their extension should be improved, should be attended by improved but streamlined safeguards. My amendments suggest two simple My amendments suggest two simple and modest ways of achieving this schedule seven to the Terrorism Act schedule seven to the Terrorism Act 2000, and schedule three to the National Security Act 2023. Authorised counter-terrorism police to stop any person passing through a port or airport on a no suspicion basis, for the purpose of determining whether they are or have been involved in terrorism or hostile activity.

Such persons may be searched, they may be detained and questioned for up to six hours. They are denied the right of silence in the face of the officer's questions. Indeed, they are liable to be prosecuted if they refuse to speak, and all these powers are exercisable, I repeat, on a no suspicion basis. There are some thousands of schedule seven examinations every year, well down from the peak, but still a significant number. That is not all. Any thing that a traveller has with them can be seized and inspected again without any need for suspicion.

That power has its origins in the historic power to rummage through hand baggage for all kinds of things in their thanks to modern technology. Things now include laptops and mobile phones. Under the existing law, the contents of these electronic devices may be copied and retained for as long as the examining officer believes they may be needed for use as evidence in criminal proceedings or in connection with deportation, which is fair enough in my book. But in addition, and relevantly to my proposed amendments, the contents may be copied and retained, and I quote for as long as is necessary for the purpose of determining whether a person is or has been involved in terrorism or hostile activity.

Clause one, three, seven of the bill would extend this power so that it applies not only to data that can be extracted from the phone itself, but, as touched on in the last group, to data that is accessible from the phone and stored on the cloud. For example, the entirety of a person's Gmail account and all their iCloud photos. The operational logic of the extension is faultless. Cloud storage is a fact of life. I have no problem with clauses 130 to 134, which apply the same principle to powers which are already well attended by safeguards.

But clause one, three, seven does give us an opportunity to reflect, not least in the light of comments from the courts on whether the government and your Lordships are content for data which has been seized without the need for suspicion, and which is the noble Lord. Clement Jones said in the last group, increasingly encapsulates every aspect of a person's private life should be retained by the police without clearer parameters. We are urged to take that opportunity. By Jonathan Hall KC, my successor, but one as independent reviewer of terrorism legislation, who suggested in a note published last October that Parliament might want to consider what safeguards will prevent excessive data being extracted and copied, how journalistic and legally privileged material on an online account will be protected, and given the quantity of personal data, which members of the public, knowingly or unknowingly hold on the cloud accessible from their device, whether, as he put it, merely travelling through a port or border is a sufficient reason to surrender so much of their privacy.

Jonathan Hall does not say for how long data is in practice, retained for the purpose of determining whether a person is involved in terrorism or hostile activity. Experience of the old regime. Management of police information suggests, however, that personal data may be retained in police systems for very long periods indeed, particularly when the grounds for doing so are so broadly and vaguely expressed. As you would expect, powers as strong as these have attracted legal challenge. The leading case was brought by Mrs.

Beagle, who was questioned under schedule seven at East Midlands Airport in 2011. The essentials of schedule seven as it then stood, were found in 2015 to be compatible with the European Convention by a majority of the Supreme Court Lord Kerr, followed by a unanimous First section of the European Court of Human Rights, found otherwise. Fortunately for those tasked with defending the power in the courts, Mrs. Beagle was not subject to the inspection, copying or retention of data on her phone, let alone, of course, on the cloud.

But the Supreme Court was sufficiently troubled by this aspect of the power to address the issue anyway. It did not object to the suspicionless seizure, copying and retention of data belonging to a person going through a port or airport. But it did express the view by way of obiter dictum in paragraph 58 of its judgment that retention beyond an initial period, for the purposes of determining whether a person is involved in terrorism, should require objective grounds for suspicion.

My amendment 390 acts on that dictum of the Supreme Court in relation to both the existing schedule seven power and the proposed amendment to it. It fixes the initial period during which no suspicion is required at three months, which might be considered rather generous to the police, given that the Supreme Court appears provisionally to have had in mind a period closer to seven days should amendment 390 find favour with your Lordships. A similar amendment to schedule three of the National Security Act could be tabled alongside it on report.

My amendment 391 is directed exclusively to the National Security Act 2023, whose schedule three allows an even broader basis for retaining cloud data than does the Terrorism Act, as proposed by the government. It will be sufficient reason for retaining such data that the constable believes it necessary, in the interests of national security or the economic well-being of the United Kingdom. National security being a concept which is famously undefined in our legislation. The test of subjective belief on the part of a constable in relation to these weighty matters is about the least onerous threshold that could be imagined.

My amendment 391 would replace it with an objective test. Indeed, the same objective test as is proposed in relation to the alternative ground for retention in paragraph two to be a in this bill. This is keyhole surgery of the most minor kind, but the least. I would suggest that this situation requires. These are probing amendments, but they do go some way to meeting the challenge that we have been posed by the independent reviewer, and they invite discussion of a question that is surely significant by any measure.

Are we or are we not prepared to contemplate meaningful limits on police retention of the most extensive private details of the lives of people who have done nothing more suspicious than pass

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through a port or airport? I assume the law would like to move an amendment. Amendment move an amendment. Amendment proposed page 100, clause 135, page proposed page 100, clause 135, page 167, line six. It ended, said the words as printed on the Marshalled List.

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List. I rise to support amendments 390

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I rise to support amendments 390 and 391, tabled by the noble Lord Anderson of Ipswich, which I have signed, and my Lords, as he explained, these amendments are designed to probe the proposed extension of border powers, powers that are already amongst the strongest vested in the police, which are usable at ports, airports and near the land border with Ireland. And the house, I think, needs very little reminder of the noble Lord Anderson's pedigree. As the independent reviewer of terrorism legislation, which informs his view of these new powers under clause 135136137, which represent a major extension of state reach, they extend the existing power to seize a physical device to include data that is accessible from the phone but stored in the cloud.

My Lords, we're no longer talking just about a handset. We are talking about the entirety of a person's Gmail account, their complete iCloud Photo Library, and their entire private digital history. Now, while the operational logic of following data in the cloud is understandable, we should reflect on the fact that this information is seized without the need for prior suspicion of an offence. And as the noble Lord Anderson's successor as he described, Jonathan Hall KC, The Independent, the current independent reviewer of terrorism legislation, has asked, is merely travelling through a port or border a sufficient reason for a citizen to surrender so much of their privacy.

And again, as the noble Lord Anderson says, amendment 390 introduces a vital safeguard based on the Supreme Court's judgment in Beagle v DPP, which stipulates that if the police wish to retain this extracted cloud data for longer than three months, they must have reasonable grounds to suspect that the individual is involved in terrorism or hostile activity. My Lords, we cannot allow the digital core of an innocent traveller to be duplicated and kept indefinitely by the state simply because they passed through a port of entry, as the noble Lord also said as regards amendment 391, My Lords, as he says, this is directed at the National Security Act 2023 and as currently drafted, the government would allow the retention of cloud data based on a purely subjective test that the constable believes that it is necessary.

My Lords, this is perhaps the least onerous threshold imaginable in our law and the amendment 391 performs what the noble Lord Anderson has described as minor keyhole surgery. By replacing this subjective belief with an objective test of necessity, which would ensure that the retention of highly sensitive personal data, which may include journalistic or legally privileged material, is governed by an actual legal standard that can be scrutinised rather than a mere
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Lord Deben Portrait Lord Deben (Conservative)
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Because I think it's dangerous to leave lawyers to talk about these matters without the intervention of non-lawyers. And secondly, because although I can claim no legal background, I am a historian. And the thing that really worries me is that the whole of history shows how often we make mistakes in the heat of dealing with a very real issue. And that's the concern I have. We have a very real issue of terrorism. We know that our enemies are using every possible mechanism to interfere with everything from our elections to the way in which our motor cars are driven.

We know that, and therefore we do want to protect ourselves as much as possible. But very often when you do that, you go two steps too far. And I believe this is some point at which we have gone two steps too far. Indeed, if I have a complaint about these amendments, is that I'm not sure that this keyhole surgery will entirely dig out all the fetid. Wrongness in in this decision. I think we need to go further, but I would ask this House to remember one of its roles is to bring to bear long experience, and it should be the long experience of this house that it's always dangerous to legislate on things like terrorism without thinking extremely carefully about how far we are going.

And I do believe that part of the reason that people accept the rule of law very generally in Britain is because they are not afraid of the kind of intervention which this makes possible, and the two things we have to put right is that in the circumstances of no suspicion, it is simply not good enough to say that a constable should have his own view about what is the national security situation, and that that should inform a decision so certain and important as this.

And the second thing we should have in mind is that we live in a world in which people's perfectly reasonable, perfectly decent information they don't want to share with everyone. I do believe that we have a right to privacy, and it isn't just because people might have an unfortunate intervention between themselves and other people that happen to be found, or that they've looked at something which perhaps would have been better not looked at, or any of those things.

That's not what I'm concerned about. I'm concerned about the way that human beings in this country think of the law, and they believe that the law protects their personal integrity and protects their right to privacy. And therefore, what I want to say to the Minister, who for whom, as he knows I have great respect. I want to say to him that this is not just about going, not going too far because of the fight against terrorism. It's also about remembering constantly what it is that maintains our respect for the rule of law.

And we only have to have one example of this being used in a ridiculous manner to find people much more widely criticising the way the law works. And therefore I beg of him to look rather carefully at this and see

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how he can meet. What is an obvious problem? Yes. Extremely briefly, because

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Extremely briefly, because compared to the expertise of my noble friends on the Crossbenches noble friends on the Crossbenches who have spoken thus far, I would probably merit nothing like keyhole probably merit nothing like keyhole surgeon. More like a butcher, really, in terms of legal matters. But I would just say that what I've But I would just say that what I've heard is very convincing coming from people with such expertise. So I very much look forward to hearing the minister's reasons for rejecting, if that's what he feels he must do.
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Lord Davies of Gower Portrait Lord Davies of Gower (Conservative)
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three, five does this, allowing constables to extract online information from defendants devices information from defendants devices should they need to determine whether the person has been involved in an act of terrorism. So I understand the government's intention behind this clause, and that it may have implications for that it may have implications for national security. But because of the importance, we should leave it the importance, we should leave it as we should leave it as little of its interpretation to human discretion as possible.

And we are all aware that whilst we continue to support our forces, there are occasional instances of bad faith actors, and more generally, mistakes are a natural product of human enterprise, and allowing a constable's belief to determine whether it is necessary to retain held information is an unnecessary risk that the government does not need to take. Similarly, my Lords, we are not opposed to the principle behind amendment 390. Individuals who are subjected to these new powers should not have the anxiety of an indefinite investigation hanging over their heads.

If the authorities do not have reasonable suspicion that a crime has been committed, and for for that reason, introducing a limit on the amount of time information can be held without reasonable suspicion is sensible. And that said, I am unsure whether three months is a long enough time for police forces to determine whether retention is necessary. This is especially the case given the heightened stress that a decrease in officer numbers will put forces under. But despite this, I hope the that the noble Lord, the Minister, can agree that a limit is a sensible suggestion and update his Lordships House on the government's position.
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Lord Hanson of Flint Portrait Lord Hanson of Flint (Labour)
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Grateful to the noble Lord Anderson of Ipswich for attempting Anderson of Ipswich for attempting keyhole surgery at this late stage, I have the suspicion that some noble Lords want to go a little bit further in the surgery than keyhole, but we'll try and assuage those fears as part of the response to the debate that we've had today. Just in initially to the noble Lords. Strasbourg, schedule seven of the Terrorism Act 2000 and schedule three to the Counter-Terrorism and Border Act 2019, are important national security powers available at the UK border.

They already allow a counter-terrorism police officer to stop, question, search and detain a person travelling through a port or the border area in Northern Ireland to determine whether the person is or has been involved in terrorism or hostile activity, respectively, and these powers do not require an examining officer to have any degree of suspicion to use them. They're already in place and have been in place since 2000, so they're not new powers. What this amendment, this new clause does, is introduces a power for law enforcement agencies to extract information from online accounts, i.e.

the cloud, wherever that cloud currently exists, that are accessible via a device examined under existing powers that allow suspicionless stop and searches of ports for national security purposes. Now, again, as the noble Lord Anderson of Ipswich has rightly said, this is responding directly to a long standing concern raised by the independent reviewer, who has noted that the current legislation does not adequately address cloud access. And I hope that to some extent assuages the concerns of Lord deben on these matters. But I accept and understand that the noble and learned Lord Garnier, and the noble and learned Lady Butler-sloss, and the noble Lord Clement-jones, and in his moving the amendments, the noble Lord Anderson of Ipswich are concerned about those issues, to ensure that we have enhanced safeguards around these powers, notably that the retention of this cloud data for counter-terrorism purposes must be reviewed after three months and can only be retained where a constable has reasonable grounds to suspect that the persons involved in terrorism is.

Amendment 391 builds on this and in respect of the information retained, looks to put an objective test for assessing necessary of retention. Now, let me just say, including also to the noble Lord Berkeley, that the government recognises fully the need for robust safeguards. I accept the points that have been made around the Committee on that basis. We do need to have robust safeguards when exercising powers to extract or retain information from electronic devices under the schedule seven and three.

However, this and this is normal practice and I hope that this will assuage the House's concern normally, and I strongly believe in this case, that statutory codes of practice for examining officers are the appropriate place to set out the detailed operational safeguards. Now, if it helps the noble Lord Anderson of Ipswich and also all other noble members who have spoken, we are seeking to address the concerns raised by updating the code of practice, which already exists, to include the measures in this potential act to provide the safeguards of the requirements that have been mentioned by noble Lords in their contributions here today.

Codes of practice are a long standing approach. It allows the government to update protections flexibly and promptly, and ensures that they can remain fit for purpose as operational needs and legal standards evolve. Now, if I can again help all those who have spoken on this and who've requested the keyhole surgery on the legislation, the code of practice themselves are subject to parliamentary approval. So in order to take this matter forward, in the event that this bill and these particular draft clauses become law, then the draft clauses themselves do not be brought into effect.

Once they are enact until such time as the parliamentary scrutiny has been approved, and that the parliamentary sorry, not parliamentary, the codes of practice that have been drafted are approved by both Houses of Parliament. So the intention would be that the codes themselves that I would be have drafted, would be subject to parliamentary scrutiny of an affirmative nature in both houses of Parliament, and that we would not seek to implement the act section if it were passed until such time as the codes of practice were approved by both Houses of Parliament, and that is the normal practice, so that following Royal assent of this Bill, that would also be subject to consultation on what the Code of practice could

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potentially involve before it was passed by both houses. I'm very grateful to the

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I'm very grateful to the Minister. Could I just ask him something as significant as this something as significant as this raised by the Supreme Court, raised by the very man who they speak to about how counter-terrorism should about how counter-terrorism should be dealt with, why shouldn't it be on the front of the bill rather

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than statutory guidance? The statutory guidance in relation to the operation of the legislation in 2000, and the purpose of the revised codes of practice, is that it's normal practice to have a code of practice approved by Parliament for how the act is implemented by officers on the ground at the port of entry, and the Code of Practice, again, is approved or not approved by both houses is subject to consultation. And I've given a commitment from this Dispatch Box that that code of practice and this act section, if it were to be an act, would not be introduced until the Code of practice was achieved.

The assent

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of both houses. Interrupt because the noble Lord

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Interrupt because the noble Lord explained that I should be happy, explained that I should be happy, because this had been requested by those who knew. Those who knew have those who knew. Those who knew have also requested that in the document itself, in the actual act, there itself, in the actual act, there should be these changes. I don't understand why it is reasonable to accept their advice to put this in, but not reasonable to accept equally sensible advice to have the restrictions which have been proposed by the Lord Anderson of

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Ipswich. Well, I've made the case. The

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Well, I've made the case. The noble Lord Anderson and others can accept that case or not. But I've accept that case or not. But I've made the case. And if the noble Lord Anderson believes that keyhole surgery is still required, then he surgery is still required, then he has a mechanism to begin the operation. But I would hope that the assurances I've given to the committee are ones which the committee can accept based on the fact that this is an amendment to the 2000 act, and the normal practice already in place is to have codes of practice, which I am proposing via the discussion to have revised codes of practice subject to parliamentary affirmative scrutiny, and that the sections of the act proposed would not be implemented until such time as both houses gave their assent to those measures.

I hope that assuages it. If it doesn't, he

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knows what to do. Sits down. I'm sorry. I must be

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Sits down. I'm sorry. I must be missing something here. There is a provision to conduct really draconian intervention on a traveller as they pass through an airport, but it's not on the basis airport, but it's not on the basis of suspicion. So on what basis does the the constable or whatever he or the the constable or whatever he or she is choose that traveller rather than another traveller if there's

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no suspicion involved. Well. Again, I hope I can help the noble Lord that you know the noble Lord that you know the schedule seven and schedule three powers are exercised at pace. Some powers are exercised at pace. Some investigations, particularly those involving complex or sensitive matters, could well extend beyond three months. Evidence often three months. Evidence often emerges gradually and may be fragmented. Now. The statutory codes of practice, in my view, codes of practice, in my view, provide a flexible and responsive mechanism for setting out detailed safeguards.

They allow for timely updates on operational legal contexts, and if we embed such details with due respect to the noble and learned Lady in primary legislation, then that creates inflexibility. It means that we may not keep pace with changing threats or operational realities. The codes are subject to parliamentary scrutiny. They can be revised as needed. They can ensure robust protection. And that's why I've put that argument before the committee. If the committee feels it's not an acceptable argument, then we have to have that discussion later on.

But that is my defence to having

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keyhole surgery at this time. Lord Anderson will be responding shortly, but I'm sure the Minister shortly, but I'm sure the Minister realizes she can't sit down quite yet. He's talked about the process, he's talked about the statutory he's talked about the statutory guidance and so on. But what he hasn't said, does he accept the substance of the amendments? And substance of the amendments? And has he given an assurance to the House that if it were House that if it were hypothetically agreed that the statutory code of guidance was an acceptable way forward, that that actually the substance of these amendments would be incorporated in the statutory guidance? Does he accept the case that the noble Lord Anderson has made so eloquently? Well.



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I think I've I think I've said to the committee that the points that the noble Lord Anderson has raised are ones that are worthy of reflection, but that we will put the discussion ultimately into the the discussion ultimately into the code of practice. And the final settlement will be a consultation on the code of practice. I've heard on the code of practice. I've heard what has been said today. There will be a consultation. There will be an opportunity for not just the noble Lord, with his former hat on and his current position in this House, but also others to comment upon it.

But that that is the case I'm making. I hope I've been able to convince the house, if not, you know, methods are available, but I hope that I've convinced the house and that if I may, given the late hour in terms of the target of amendments we're trying to reach, I would rest, if I may, my case.
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Lord Anderson of Ipswich Portrait Lord Anderson of Ipswich (Crossbench)
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remarkable thing that so many people spoke so strongly in support of these amendments. And I'll single out, if I may, the noble single out, if I may, the noble Lord Davies of Gower, for whom we all have respect as a former police officer, and I think former police officer, and I think to have his approval for these amendments is a message that I very much hope will be heard across the much hope will be heard across the chamber on the government front bench. These amendments are operationally perfectly simple, and nobody has suggested that this would be a great burden on the police or any bureaucratic impediment to the police doing their job.

And if they had been, I for one would have been very reluctant to propose them. But although they're operationally simple, they are, as the noble and learned Lord Garnier said of constitutional importance. They may look technical, but they are important. And on that theme, I'll address, if I may, the Minister's remarks in relation to the Code of Practice and the consultation on the Code of Practice. My Lords, that really is not enough. If the law says it is enough for a constable to have a subjective belief that the economic well-being of the United Kingdom is being harmed, then it will avail nobody to complain that there was no objective evidence or no reasonable suspicion.

And the Minister heard from the noble and learned Lady Butler-sloss, perhaps an indication of what the reaction of the courts might be to an argument of that kind. So I thank the Minister for his offer, but I'm afraid it is simply a deflection. And this is pre-eminently an issue that needs to be addressed on the face of the bill. I'll just end with two further thoughts, if I may, for the Minister to consider. The first relates to schedule seven. For most of the last decade, schedule seven was the most controversial aspect of our counter-terrorism laws.

One reason for that is, of course, it potentially affects a lot of people. A lot of people used to be stopped at airports and were questioned. It took over from the old no suspicion stop and search power, which was repealed when Theresa may was home secretary back in 2011 or 2012. And the reason that it was diffused as an issue of major public concern was because of some sensible but quite minor changes that were made to it. For example, nine hours detention was taken down to six hours.

Several other technical changes were made. And I think people who are upset by schedule seven and saw it as targeted on them and their community were reassured by that, that Parliament was looking at it and Parliament was prepared to respond to some of their concerns. So again, although this may look very technical on the pages of the bill, I do ask the Minister just to remember that we've reached a sort of equilibrium on schedule seven, but it's a very delicate one. And if you're going to increase the powers in this manner, it's really important to think about safeguards as well.

And the second point, I'd ask him just to reflect on, you know, he may not accept my arguments, but may I put the pragmatic case to him that these arguments have been put not only by me, not only by previous independent reviewers and the noble Lord. Carlile was also a great reformer of schedule seven. They've been put by the Supreme Court, which felt strongly enough about this issue to single it out for comment in a case in which the issue didn't arise. Now, as a lawyer and a member of the Brotherhood of the law, I'm delighted by anything that could produce more excuses for litigation.

But such little cost, administratively or otherwise, the Minister has it in his power to do what the Supreme Court suggested and neutralize, no doubt lengthy, and one might almost say pointless about of litigation. So I close with that. I know the Minister has a lot on his plate, but in view of the the way this debate has gone and the points that have been made from right around the House, I do hope the Minister will find time to meet perhaps the noble Lord Clement Jones, and with me, perhaps with others, if they if they want to come and discuss this properly.

I was sorry to hear him say he had a defence against keyhole surgery. Keyhole surgery is designed to help. It's not the sort of thing one should have to defend against. He should count himself lucky he's meeting surgeons and not butchers. But we are very, very keen to meet

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him and I hope you might agree. In the meantime, of course, I beg to withdraw the amendment. Is it your Lordships pleasure

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Is it your Lordships pleasure the amendment be withdrawn? The amendment is by leave withdrawn. Amendment 391. Lord Anderson not Amendment 391. Lord Anderson not moved. Amendment 319 schedule. The moved. Amendment 319 schedule. The question is the clause 135 stand part of the bill? As many as are that opinion will say content the that opinion will say content the contrary not content. The contents have it. The question is clause 136 stand part of the bill? As many as are of that opinion will say content the contrary, not content.

The contents have it in schedule 14, amendment 392. Already spoken to Lord Hanson of Fleet Move formerly. The question is amendment 392 be agreed to? As many as are of that opinion will say content the contrary not content. The contents have it. The question is that should you 14 be the 14th schedule to the bill, as many as are of that opinion as they content the contrary not content. The contents have it amendment 393 and 394 already spoken to Lord Hanson of Fleet move formerly.

The question is that amendment 393 and 394 be agreed to. As many as are of that opinion will say content the contrary not content. The contents have it. The question is that that clause 137 stand part of the bill. As many as are that opinion will say content the contrary not content. The contents have it in clause 138, amendment 394 a the

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Lord Hanson of Flint. I beg to move the amendment standing my name on the partial list. I hope I can be brief with list. I hope I can be brief with these amendments because they're relatively straightforward. Clause 138 enables the Secretary of State to make driver information to make driver information regulations about access to the driver licensing information held by the DVLA, by the police and by the DVLA, by the police and other law enforcement agencies. The provision applies UK wide and, insofar as it applies to Northern insofar as it applies to Northern Ireland, relates to a mix of reserved and transferred matters.

Now we've had discussions with the
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Lord Hanson of Flint Portrait Lord Hanson of Flint (Labour)
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Department of Justice in Northern Ireland and the amendments in my name three nine for a provide that. The Secretary of State may only The Secretary of State may only make the driver information regulations, insofar as they relate to devolved policing agencies in to devolved policing agencies in Northern Ireland, in particular the Police Service of Northern Ireland, with the consent of the Department of Justice, the Northern Ireland of Justice, the Northern Ireland Executive is taking forward a legislative consent motion in the Northern Ireland Assembly on this Northern Ireland Assembly on this basis, and I hope that the Committee can support that proposal.

Amendments 397A and 397BA technical amendments clarifying simply the period covered by the first annual report about the use of driver licensing information as clause one, three, eight is currently drafted. That period begins with the commencement day. That is, the day on which clause one three, eight comes into force. However, there will not be a single day for clause 138 coming into force, as clause 210 partially brings clause 138 into force on Royal Assent for the purpose of making regulations.

With these amendments, the first Annual report will cover the period beginning with the date clause one three eight comes into force and ending on December the 31st of the year in question, which I think is relatively straightforward. We've had, again, amendments and discussions with the Department of Justice, and they respect the devolution settlement as it applies to Northern Ireland. And I commend those amendments which simply tidy up to the committee. Now, I note, and I'll just speak to it now that the noble Baroness, Lady Ducie, has amendment 396.

I just want to say two things before she speaks so it can help inform her contribution. First of all, that I want to be clear. The clause 138 is only intended to tidy up existing legislation to ensure that all those who need access to DVLA driving licence data have clear legal powers to do so. And secondly, I just want to say to before she gives her views that she is aware, because we've talked about it before, that there's a new legal framework being developed on law enforcement for facial recognition and similar technologies.

I don't want to repeat what I said earlier, but I would encourage her and other noble Lords to submit their views on this by the 12th of February. I hope that's helpful, but I'm very

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happy to hear what she says first. And then.

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Proposed clause 138 page 171. Insert the words as printed on the Marshalled List. My Lords.

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My Lords. I rise to speak to amendment three nine, six tabled in my name, which raises fundamental issues which raises fundamental issues about this part of the bill. My concern is clause 138, and it's clear potential to enable facial recognition searches of the Dvla's vast image database. That would be a dramatic change. At present, driver's data can only be accessed
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Baroness Doocey Portrait Baroness Doocey (Liberal Democrat)
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for road traffic purposes. Amendment 396 would place a safeguard in the bill to prevent authorised persons from using information obtained under these information obtained under these powers for the purposes of biometric searches using facial recognition technology. It would ensure that the private images of millions of citizens cannot be millions of citizens cannot be repurposed to feed, live or retrospective facial recognition systems without full parliamentary debate and explicit consent. Around 55 million facial images are held by the DVLA, collected in good faith and with a clear expectation of privacy, alongside names, addresses and medical records for the routine purposes of getting a driving licence, turning that repository into a police biometric pool would mark a profound shift in the relationship between the state and the citizen, combined with live facial recognition on our streets, it would create the infrastructure for real time population scale surveillance, scanning the faces of tens of millions of law abiding people as they go about their daily lives.

In effect, most of us would find ourselves on a perpetual digital watch list. Our faces repeatedly checked for potential wrongdoing. That's troubling, not only because of the bias and misidentification in these systems, but because it's simply not proportionate. Policing the public broadly support the use of technology to catch criminals, but they also want limits and safeguards. A 2024 survey by the Centre of Emerging Technology and Security and the Alan Turing Institute found that only 1 in 5 people that's just 19% trusted police forces to use biometric tools responsibly.

That anxiety is particularly strong among women. Barely three years ago, the Casey review exposed appalling misogyny and serious abuse of data access within policing. Against that backdrop, granting digital access to millions of female drivers, personal details and photographs is hardly reassuring, especially when previous safeguards have failed so spectacularly. Last year alone, 229 serving police officers and staff were arrested for domestic abuse related offences and a further 1200 were on restricted duties linked to such allegations.

The fear is real that combining facial recognition with DVLA access could allow abusers within policing to misuse these powers, to trace survivors, to remove their freedom, to hide and to undermine public trust. Still further. We also know that this technology misidentifies members of ethnic minority communities far more frequently compounding injustice and eroding confidence in policing by consent. My Lords, I share the ambition for policing to use data more intelligently. Forces need joined up intelligence systems across the entire criminal justice network.

But there is a world of difference between targeted access to high risk offender data and a blank check to harvest the personal information of millions of innocent people. Clause 138, as drafted, is far too wide. It allows the Secretary of State to authorise digital access for policing or law enforcement purposes, which, frankly, could mean anything. What information may be accessed and for what purpose would be set by regulation made under the negative procedure, giving Parliament only the most cursory scrutiny of measures with huge implications for privacy and liberty.

Such sweeping powers should not be slipped through in secondary legislation. The public did not give their driving licence photographs to become part of a national face search system. There's been no debate, no consent, no assessment of the risks to those who have good reason to remain hidden. My Lords, once civic freedoms are eroded, they are very rarely rebuilt. When the Minister replies, I hope we will hear what the government's policy intention is. If their intention is to keep open the possibility of using DVLA data for surveillance, they should say so and try to justify it.

We know the police have asked specifically for this. It's not good enough to say this is our intention. My amendment would ensure it cannot happen. That is the safeguard the public expect and the least this House should demand. demand.
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Lord Strasburger Portrait Lord Strasburger (Liberal Democrat)
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Yeah, yeah. >> My Lords, I rise to speak in favour of amendment 396, to which I added my name. It's only two pages. This will ensure that the DVLA drivers database is not used for a purpose for which it was never intended, namely to search drivers photos for a match with images collected via live facial recognition, facial recognition technology could be a useful tool in fighting serious crime if it was properly regulated and supervised, which is the case with other biometric technologies such as fingerprints and DNA.

But currently it's open season on facial recognition, with no statutory constraints on constraints on its use or misuse. That means that this deeply invasive mass surveillance tool poses a serious threat to the civil liberties and human rights of UK citizens, if used in combination with the DVLA drivers database, it would be a disproportionate expansion of police powers to identify and track innocent citizens across time and locations for low level policing needs. It would give the authorities access to biometric biometric data of tens of millions of our fellow citizens.

It's vital that safeguards are introduced in law to prevent this from happening. And this is precisely what amendment 396 does. My Lords, during the Committee stage of this bill. In the other place, the policing Minister said, and I quote, police forces do not conduct facial recognition matching against images contained on the DVLA database, and this clause will not change that end quote. But clause 138 allows regulations to be made at a later date, setting out how driver licensing information will be made accessible to law enforcement.

All that amendment 396 does is create safeguards to ensure that the regulations made under clause one, three, eight cannot provide for facial recognition. Searches of the DVLA database. I

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commend it to the committee. I'm afraid you're going to get

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I'm afraid you're going to get the full set today. My Lords. My Lords, I rise to support my noble Lords, I rise to support my noble friend's amendment 396, which really is the meat of this group of really is the meat of this group of amendments. Proposed by my noble friend Baroness Doocey and signed friend Baroness Doocey and signed by me, which addresses the privacy implications of clause 138. While the government describes this clause as a technical clarification of access to DVLA records, we on these benches and groups like Big Brother Watch see it as the foundation for a vast national facial recognition database.

And it's also a massive pre-emption, in our view, of the consultation on live facial recognition, which is being conducted currently by the government. This amendment provides a specific and essential statutory bar. Authorised persons may not use DVLA information for biometric searches using facial recognition technology. Members of the public applying for driving licence to drive cars are. Apply for driving licence licences to drive cars not to be placed in a permanent digital line up without their consent. And we know that facial recognition technology is demonstrably biased.

My Lords, as we've discussed earlier on committee today, expanding its use to a database of tens of millions of law abiding citizens is a grossly disproportionate interference with the right to privacy. Under article eight of the Echr. The government claims that this is not their intention. Yet they have not put that promise on the face of the Bill. If the Minister is sincere, that this power will not be used for mass biometric surveillance, then he should have no objection to this amendment.

We cannot allow the
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Lord Davies of Gower Portrait Lord Davies of Gower (Conservative)
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accompany them. And we are sympathetic to the principle that underpins the government's underpins the government's amendments. 304 A it respects the devolution settlement in Northern Ireland and a particular constitutional and operational sensitivities around policing them. There is a careful balance that must be struck between maintaining consistency across the United Kingdom, respecting the powers of devolved administrations, and ensuring that law enforcement agencies have the tools they need to keep the public safe. There is also a parallel balance that must must be struck between safeguarding individual liberties and being robust in tackling crime.

And while we recognise the intent behind the amendment, we also acknowledge that the government must retain sufficient flexibility to ensure effective and coherent law enforcement arrangements across all parts of the UK, and I look forward to hearing the noble Lords, the Minister's response in addressing both of these issues. I now turn to amendment 396, which would prohibit the use of DVLA database for searches using live facial recognition technology, and it will probably come as no surprise to hear that we are firmly opposed to that restriction, as it would undermine one of the key inputs on which the success of live facial recognition hinges.

Live facial recognition is an important and increasingly effective tool in modern policing, used lawfully and proportionately, it has already demonstrated its value in identifying serious offenders, locating wanted individuals, and preventing violent crime before it occurs. It is particularly effective in high crime environments and transport hubs, where the risk of serious harm is elevated and where rapid identification can make a decisive difference. Equally, across the DVLA, driver licensing data for law nor is it unregulated. Clause 138 ensures that the use of this it is accompanied by safeguards.

Regulation making powers. The Secretary of State consultation requirements, a statutory code of practice and annual reporting reporting to Parliament. These measures are designed to ensure proportionality and accountability to carve out facial recognition from this framework would unnecessarily, we say, impede law enforcement's ability to use the technology effectively, and it would deny the police the ability to use accurate and targeted technology to identify individuals suspected of serious criminality, even were strong safeguards are in place. So I therefore welcome the opportunity for the Minister to expand on how facial recognition fits within this framework and on the safeguards that will ensure its use is proportionate and effective.

But we should be clear this technology that can save lives, disrupt violent crime and protect the public. It should not be ruled out by default. Finally, amendment 397 B is a drafting amendment which concerns the timing of the Secretary of State's first annual report. We support the principle behind the annual report, which will play a vital role in reassuring the public that these powers are not being misused and it will enable regular, proper parliamentary scrutiny and ensure that access to driver information is both effective in tackling crime and not exploited or allowed to drift beyond its intended purpose.

So, taken together, this group highlights the importance of embracing innovation in policing while maintaining public trust with the safeguards already built into the bill. And we believe the balance can be rightly struck. And I look forward to hearing from the noble Lord. As always, the

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Minister's thoughts on this topic. I'm grateful to the noble Baroness for her explanation on the comments, and I'm grateful, I think, comments, and I'm grateful, I think, for the general acceptance of the government amendments, which are to just tidy up where we are to date. just tidy up where we are to date. I hope I can reassure the noble Lady with regard to the concerns that she's expressed in amendment that she's expressed in amendment 396. First of all, I want to be clear that clause 138 is only intended to tidy up existing legislation to ensure that all legislation to ensure that all those who need access to DVLA driving licence data have a clear legal basis to do so.

The police currently use automatically access DVLA data for Road Traffic Act enforcement, but are unable to use such data when investigating serious crime. The bill, together with future regulations and a code of practice, will allow wider use of data obtained automatically. But I want to be absolutely clear for the noble Lady that the aim is to allow the DVLA to provide information to the police. It is not designed to allow the police to send an image to the DVLA, and for them to search their database for an identity of an unknown person, and I hope that gives some clarity to her.

I also want to just say to all three noble Lords from the Liberal Democrat benches that have spoken, that the code of practice that we're producing and the future regulations we're producing are going to be an affirmative regulations in both Houses of Parliament to Clause 38 to bring it
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Lord Hanson of Flint Portrait Lord Hanson of Flint (Labour)
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in. So I would say to the noble Lady, it is only tidying up and is affirmative in the revised affirmative in the revised legislation and on the facial recognition I hope I've given in the previous discussions that we've the previous discussions that we've had a considerable amount of detail on that. There is the consultation. It does close on 12th of February. It does close on 12th of February. We want to provide strong regulation of facial recognition. And as I said in committee previously, I hope that that will previously, I hope that that will be a useful, constructive dialogue going forward and I hope the noble Lady will be able to not move her amendment based on those comments.



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Question is it? I beg to move the amendments in

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I beg to move the amendments in Again. The question is that this amendment be agreed to as many of amendment be agreed to as many of that opinion shall be content, contrary not content. The contents have it. The question is that have it. The question is that clause 138, as amended, stand part of the bill, as many of that opinion shall say. Content contrary, opinion shall say. Content contrary, not content. The contents have it. We now come to the group of amendments beginning with amendment

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395. Lord Hanson of Flint. Thank you for.

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Thank you for. Letting me formally question is that this amendment be agreed to as many of that? Well, that opinion is many of that? Well, that opinion is content. Amendment 396 Baroness Desai not moved. Not moved. Amendments (397) 397-8397 be Lord Hanson, move formally en bloc. Question is that these amendments be agreed to as many of that opinion shall say content contrary not content the contents have it question is that clause 138 as amended, shall stand part of the bill, as many of that opinion should I consent? Clause 139 stand part of the Bill, as many of that opinion shall say, content not content, that schedule 15 be the 15th schedule to the bill, as many of that opinion as content contrary not content, the contents have it and clauses 140 to 143 stand part of the bill, as many of that opinion shall say.

Content contrary, not content. Contents have it after clause 143, amendment 398 Earl Attlee not not moved moved. Question is that clause 144 stand part of the bill, as many of that opinion shall say? Content contrary not content. The contents have it after clause 144, amendment 399. Baroness do see not moved. Not moved. So we now come to the group of amendments beginning with amendment 403, amendment four, after clause 144, amendment 403. Earl, aptly.
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Earl Attlee Portrait Earl Attlee (Conservative)
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My Lords, I beg to move on my amendment 403 and speak to 403, a amendment 403 and speak to 403, a (400) 441-3416 and 416M. We now come to amendment concerned with abnormal load movements and how the abnormal load movements and how the police manage them. At Second Reading, I outline the problem, which is partly about certain officers taking unnecessary steps to justify their existence. But mostly it is about the money. I understand that the video clip of my Second Reading speech has been shared through social through industry social media at least 15,000 times.

My Lords, I'm very grateful to the noble Lord Hanson and Katz for organising a meeting with the policy determining Minister at the Home Office and appropriate officials and police representatives next week. This will be very helpful. This means that I can avoid wearying the committee with several highly technical groups of amendments, and instead only have one group. My Lords, I remind the committee that I own and operate a tank transporter on behalf of the museum and Ministers have full details.

I have not been personally affected by the problems that I will seek to address. My Lords, before going any further, I would like to say a word about traffic officers. We should all be really grateful to these officers who work tirelessly to improve road safety. I have never been proceeded against for a traffic offence, but I can understand how irritating that must be. However, prosecutions and enforcement action are necessary in order to reduce casualties on the road. We must also remember that it is traffic police officers who have to attend the scene of a devastating road traffic accident.

My Lords, there are 43 police forces in England and Wales and my amendment only concern about eight who I would politely describe as being errant. The 35 others operate the legislation known as the Special Types General Order, as intended, and are not a problem, and they should be proud of their work. The legislation is fit for purpose so long as all involved act in good faith. Guess which police force does not do so and seeks to lead the others astray? As I explained at Second Reading, Westminster's Place West WMP have increased their income from escorting abnormal loads from £14,000 to 1.1 million in 5 years.

Not surprisingly, West Midlands Police are stalling on FOI requests from industry, as are West Yorkshire Police. My Lords, WMP and about seven others are persecuting and harassing the heavy industry when it is not necessary or proportionate. If it was, we would see the excellent commercial vehicle unit of the Metropolitan Police adopting the same tactics and policies we do not. The Mets and the Met's income from escorting abnormal loads has remained static and modest.

The tactics employed by West Midlands Police are the ones that you would expect to see used by by a corrupt police force in a slowly developing country. These range from seeking unnecessary technical details that can be later checked for preciseness, deliberately misquoting or misapplying regulations, and prohibiting vehicle movements when there is no power to do so, and by unnecessarily insisting that each abnormal load notification only refers to one vehicle registration number, the number of abnormal load notifications, but not movements has increased by about 100%.

Nationally, the regulations have not changed. This is purely the result of a few junior police officers screwing up the system. My Lords, I produced a report dated the 10th of May 2024, so I am not jumping on the bandwagon where I stated on my personal honour as a member of your Lordships House that I personally witnessed, officers of West Midlands Police harass drivers and crew of one of the most professional heavy haulage companies in the land.

They did this by checking every conceivable document and measuring and examining everything that was possible. I knew they would be doing this because I was told that they had done it on each of the preceding three days. Such excessive and overzealous checks are interfering with the smooth running of the heavy haulage industry, which is racking up significant extra costs in all the wasted time spending responding to these demands. And some businesses are having to take on extra staff just to deal with the bureaucracy generated by these police forces.

And I look forward to the contribution of the noble Lord, Lord Faulkner of Worcester. As I said, my Lords, these repetitive checks are largely unnecessary and only serve to justify the productivity reducing activities of the police officers involved. The committee may ask itself, why does the industry not just complain to the iOPC? I'm sorry to say that the iOPC is not well placed to understand these technical issues. Furthermore, for reasons of resources and practicality, the iOPC have to refer relatively minor matters back to the professional standards department of the very same police forces that gave rise to the industry complaint.

It is obvious that such a complaint being referred back to West Midlands Police would have no effect, as that police force is hopelessly compromised by the amount of money involved and as we have seen recently, it is dysfunctional. I am sure that I do not need to remind your Lordships that in addition to my own concerns, we have all seen this week that the Home Secretary has lost confidence in the Chief Constable of West Midlands Police, and I support her even at the highest level, West Midlands Police officers appear to be unable to separate fact from fiction and in my own dealings with the Assistant Chief Constable of West Midlands Police, Mike O'Hara, it appears that he has done nothing about the documentary evidence I presented to him, setting out that something was going very seriously wrong with his internal procedures.

And, my Lords, I can privately share the evidence with your Lordships. The Committee may also ask why industry does not resort to judicial review. The answer is that it has. About 12 months ago. Unfortunately, as the committee will understand, the judicial system is collapsing because both this government and the previous government have not properly resourced it. It also appears to be overwhelming, overwhelmed by the numerous people type cases, often involving convention rights. As a result, jlr's of a commercial nature are not being considered by the court with any great priority.

My Lords, I now turn to the issue of police escort charges. There are no regulations about how much a police force can charge for providing a police police escort, and in what circumstances. Nearly every day, West Midlands Police will charge several different heavy hauliers for a minimum six hour shift, even though the actual time spent escorting the load could be as low as 30 minutes. They will use the same team of officers for each of the jobs, and the charge is 2500 pounds per time, which far exceeds the total cost of the heavy haulage itself, which only commands about £2,000 per day.

My Lords, my amendment for one. Three requires the Secretary of State to make regulations about charging for police escorts, and this is expected to largely deal with the behaviour issues. It is very strongly supported by industry. If the noble Lord, the Minister, wants to claim that this is an operational matter for the police, then surely the same should apply to firearms licensing fees. That is what is behind my probing amendment, for one for which I hope that the Minister doesn't actually accept.

My Lords, in most police forces, the officers or officials who make the decision as to whether or not a load needs to be escorted by the police are not the ones who pick up the overtime payments in West Midlands Police. They very much are. My amendment 416M prevents this. My Lords, my understanding and the intelligence given to me suggests that it was made clear to the construction consortium building the TransPennine route upgrade. Upgrade a railway scheme, the true suggestion was made by officers of West Yorkshire Police that if they were funded from some for some new police cars, they would experience fewer problems with abnormal load movements.

So far as I can see, West Yorkshire Police are competing very hard with West Midlands Police in this respect. A written answer to a parliamentary question informs us that the true transferred to West Yorkshire Police, £175,000 for some snazzy Volvo Ex90 cars. To put this into context, this is more than the total annual income for providing police escorts for Surrey, Sussex, Leicestershire, Thames Valley and probably the met combined. Can the Minister explain to the committee what he thinks is going on, so that I can be fully informed when I discuss it with Transparency International next week? My amendment 406 seeks to prevent this from happening again.

My Lords, turn to my my amendment 403. I will have to be brief. It was about 20 years ago that the then Labour government made the excellent policy decision that henceforth, abnormal loads would normally be escorted by industry rather than by the police, except in certain circumstances. The policy worked really well, but it was originally intended that under schedule five of the Police Reform Act 2002, the police would accredit suitable self escorts so that they had police powers to direct traffic and permit traffic regulations to be broken.

Since the legislation was passed, very few accreditations have been made by the police, despite much effort in seeking them, and I can well understand why the police were reluctant to accredit it would make it an offence for a motorist not to comply with instruction from a self escort person, even though it would not be obvious that police powers were being exercised. I think it would cause all sorts of difficulties taking such cases to court if necessary. Furthermore, I can see how it would be akin to giving a blank cheque to a self escort.

For these reasons, I've tabled amendment 404, which deletes paragraph 91 of schedule five of the Police Reform Act, 2002. My Lords, instead of accreditation, my amendment 403 seeks to give the power to the Chief Constable to grant a traffic regulation dispensation order to a person engaged in escorting an abnormal load. And it works as follows. The Secretary of State can designate which regulations can be dispensed with. The Chief Constable has flexibility in that regulations could be dispensed with for the whole of the movement, or only at a specific location.

When the operator makes a movement notification, the the dispensation required would be requested. The Chief Constable can specify what mitigations are required, such as the number of escort vehicles and attendants. The capabilities of the operator can be taken into account so that the Chief Constable does not have to make a dispensation to an operator who lacks the necessary skills and experience to perform the manoeuvre in question. My Lords. Section 137 of the Highways Act 1980 makes it an offence to obstruct the traffic without lawful reason or excuse.

Some police forces claim, when it suits them, that using legitimate escort techniques is illegal, and it is certainly not clear. On Tuesday we discussed the case law in Ziegler, but I am not aware of any case law regarding abnormal load escorts. My amendment 403 A makes it clear that a person who has been granted a traffic regulation dispensation order does have lawful reason or excuse to obstruct the traffic. This could be on on foot or by using an escort vehicle.

It is expected that the Chief Constable would always allow a solid white line in the middle of the road to be crossed when granting a dispensation. My Lords, if in due course we adopt my substantive amendment or something like them, we will largely solve some very serious problems, adversely affecting industry and productivity. My Lords, I beg to move.
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Lord Faulkner of Worcester Portrait Lord Faulkner of Worcester (Labour)
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Proposed articles 144. Insert >> Proposed articles 144. Insert the new clause as printed on the Marshalled List.

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I wish to congratulate the. Noble Lord Attlee for tabling these important amendments, for working important amendments, for working so hard on this cause over many years, and for speaking so persuasively about it. Tonight I've. I've added my name to amendment 413 as indeed has his noble friend Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay, who unfortunately can't be here today, a sector which makes particular use of abnormal load road movements are heritage railways. I remind the Committee of my interest as president of the Heritage Railways Association.

The movement of most heritage rolling stock between railways, whether historic steam or diesel locomotives or vintage carriages, is undertaken by road on low loaders. Most commonly this takes place in connection with gala events featuring visiting locomotives, but also occurs when items of rolling stock are being transported for specialist maintenance or overhaul. Such road movements are classified as abnormal. Loads are undertaken by specialist haulage contractors, sometimes accompanied by an escort vehicle. A number of police forces, as noble Earl has explained, though not all, particularly Staffordshire, West Midlands and West Yorkshire forces now make charges for escorting abnormal loads within their constabulary area, typically between £2,500 and £5,000 per trip.

But this can be higher and indeed exceed the holiest charges, with some charges in excess of £7,000. Charges are also levied in Derbyshire, Greater Manchester, South Yorkshire and parts of Scotland. This is seriously disrupting the business activities of heritage railways and adding significantly to their costs in an already challenging economic and business climate. The reasons for ch have ever been explained. Widespread inconsistency with some forces making charges and others not most determine if a police escort is required based on weight, say a gross weight of 80 to 100 tons.

Plus, there is some determinant on length for 28m from the front to the rear of the lorry. Crucially, there is no national policy or framework that regulates how or when police police forces may charge for escorting or for authorising these essential movements. This inconsistency results in these arbitrary and often excessive fees in certain police force areas. In some cases, escort is only required for a few miles to the county boundary, with the rest of the journey then being unescorted and to avoid charges.

Some hauliers are now having to take massive detours around the police force area with which, but that does of course add mileage, cost and increasing and increases their negative environmental impact. The National Police Chiefs Council have issued guidance which, while intended to provide consistency and clarification, still needs decisions on provision of escorts and charging to individual forces as police forces are autonomous bodies, several heritage railways and their heritage contractors have written to those police forces which make charges, but no changes to their charging regimes.

Regimes have been forthcoming. There are many examples I could quote, but given the lateness of the hour, I don't intend to mention more than one. And this is evidence from Noel Hartley, the operations manager of the Keighley and Worth Valley Railway. He writes The Keighley and Worth Valley Railway is suffering significantly from movements out of Ingrow. That's an intermediate station on the line in West Yorkshire and is deciding not to run certain events or we are no longer able to make enthusiast events a gold standard.

Of course, we simply can't justify the charges for return movement of a visiting loco. It's nearly costing 5500 pounds on top of the movement costs for an event with gross revenue of £80,000 to 100 to £90,000, it just isn't feasible to stand these sort of costs, which can wipe out a significant proportion of the profit. In addition to the facts of police charges, he goes on, the hauliers are trying to mitigate the cost of charges by avoiding the routes where they are charging, something I referred to a moment ago, and this means that some lorries can be diverted up to 100 miles to avoid these areas.

This means that the police charges are avoided, but there is still an impact on costs due to additional fuel required. West Midlands Police, about which we've heard a lot from Lord Attlee, and a force which is much in the news this week for other reasons, are the main culprit for. That. The hauliers avoid because they are charging for escorts on so-called straight line routes. Mr. Hartley points out that areas particularly affected are railways in West Yorkshire and the Midlands, and also that includes Kidderminster, Burton, Ecclesbourne Chesterfield.

But South Wales and East Lancashire are also affected by having to make huge detours to avoid travelling within the territory of a least helpful and most expensive police forces. The lengths that hauliers are having to go to in order to avoid changes mean it's having an impact on the amount of emissions produced from road transport, which could be avoided. It amounts to thousands of additional and unnecessary miles per year, at a time when the heritage railway sector is struggling with increases in costs, not only from general utility increases and staff costs.

Thus the tripling of the cost of coal. These peace escort charges are compounding the problem and making it sometimes impossible for railways to provide that unique visitor experience on which our country is unmarred all over the world. Overall, my Lords, these excessive and inconsistent charges create uncertainty, delays and significant financial pressure on heritage railways, which I've said many times in your Lordships House are a key part of the UK's visitor economy and which in many cases are the primary anchor tourist attractions within their areas, generating significant economic and employment benefits for the for

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their regions. I congratulate and I support his amendment. I want to just. Talk very briefly.

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Talk very briefly. To the. Amendment that my. Noble friend Lord Attlee spent

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Noble friend Lord Attlee spent about. 15 seconds talking about. That's to say, his amendment for That's to say, his amendment for one four. And I was at the outset of his remarks worried that he of his remarks worried that he might be actually positively going to support his own amendment. But he, he he very quickly said that he, he he hoped that the Minister would not accept it, and so do I, because if one looks at the the draft of the amendment four and four, it's designed to allow chief officers of police to set and vary any fee payable for shotguns and firearms.

It's not quite clear from the the draft of the amendment of the new clause whether this would, if enacted, cover just England and Wales or whether it would cover England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. If the latter, that would be 45 separate chief officers of police, who may well decide to set separate fees for each of the of the 45 police territorial areas. If only England and Wales will, then you've got 43. That's bad enough. I declare an interest, of course, as a holder of a shotgun certificate, and whilst I admire in every possible way the
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Lord Garnier Portrait Lord Garnier (Conservative)
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Chief Constable of my own police area, I don't wish him to have the area, I don't wish him to have the ability to set the the level of the firearm certificate fee. It's a tax firearm certificate fee. It's a tax and if it isn't a tax, it's a fee which should be set by one person who is accountable to Parliament, who is accountable to Parliament, namely the Secretary of State. I think I need to say no more, not think I need to say no more, not least because my noble friend Lord Attlee encouraged me greatly by saying precisely very little about

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it himself. The only purpose of 414 is to

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The only purpose of 414 is to stop the Minister from saying it's an operational matter for the police, because if the police charges for abnormal load escorts on operational matters to the police, then shall we? Firearms licensing? I have no, no intention. But what I would say, though, is that we've been screwing down the cost of the firearms certificates, which means that police forces aren't able to do as good a job as they would like. And the cost of a firearms certificate is less than the cost of the visit to the

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dentist. My Lords, this group of amendments from lately covering the amendments from lately covering the safe and proportionate and fair oversight of abnormal loads, raises an important issue, and one that I an important issue, and one that I have not particularly been aware of until looking into this group of amendments. And clearly I hadn't appreciated this area had been such a social media hit since Second
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Baroness Pidgeon Portrait Baroness Pidgeon (Liberal Democrat)
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a social media hit since Second Reading. And we've heard from Lord Faulkner about the heritage rail industry and their use of abnormal loads. But I've received correspondence via Helen Morgan MP outlining the real challenges for those who work in the heavy transport sector. Working with specialist contractors rather who operate abnormal loads across the UK highways infrastructure. And as, as this correspondent rightly points out, no infrastructure or major engineering project is possible without the heavy transport industry and as a number of the amendments seek to address the inconsistencies of how police forces handle heavy transport, abnormal loads and mobile crane movements, issues that directly impact these businesses.

And as I understand the situation, there is no national framework regulating when or how police forces charge for escorting or authorising these essential movements. So this is leading to, as we've heard, arbitrary and excessive fees in some areas, whilst others provide the service at no cost, creating uncertainty, delays and financial burdens that undermine operational efficiency and investment confidence. And one example I have seen is about a project to transfer a piling rig through the West Midlands, which we've heard a lot about today, which was absolutely delayed due to the unexpected police escort charges and the availability of those escort services.

So these amendments, amongst other things, are looking for the Home Secretary to introduce clear regulations on police charging for escorts and the authorisations ensuring we have transparency, proportionality and national consistency. And I understand these amendments have strong industry backing from organisations including the HTA Construction Plant Hire Association and the Road Haulage Association, amongst others. And I completely understand the thinking behind some of the amendments from regarding the charging for special police services around this issue of abnormal loads.

And I also agree there is a concern about different charging regimes and practices, though I understand that this may have already been partly addressed by the National Police Chiefs Council guidance and the legal framework. But I would like assurance from the noble Lord, the Minister, that this is the case. I'm sure the government will not want to change the Road Vehicles Order 2003 without a full consultation and impact assessment. Given. This is about the safe movement of abnormal loads on our highways infrastructure.

However, there is clearly a need for a consistent national approach across all police forces and given many of these abnormal loads are supporting infrastructure and the growth agenda, I look forward to the Minister's response.
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Lord Davies of Gower Portrait Lord Davies of Gower (Conservative)
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My Lord. Sir, let me start by >> My Lord. Sir, let me start by thanking my noble friend, the noble Earl, the noble Lord, Earl Attlee, for his long standing commitment to for his long standing commitment to this very important issue. And I would venture to say that there is not another noble Lord in this House who cares as deeply as my noble friend is about the topic of abnormal loads. Amendment 403 seeks to allow the police to authorise an abnormal low driver to break normal traffic rules in order to negotiate the chosen route for the road for the load.

Amendment 404 404 seeks to repeal the power of the police to grant certain police powers to a person escorting an abnormal load, and it seems that the original intention of schedule five of the Police Reform Act 2002 was so that the police had the powers to direct traffic and permit regulations to be broken where necessary. However, few accreditations have made it as it would effectively allow a self escort and not to comply with the rules of the World. Amendment 403 and 404, taken together, would repeal this problem and offers a more flexible solution instead of accreditation.

Amendment 403 enables the Chief Constable to grant a traffic regulation dispensation order to a person escorting an abnormal load, and it seems common sense to provide the Secretary of State with the flexibility needed to decide which regulations should be dispensed with. Moreover, the Chief Constable would have the authority to outline any conditions they consider necessary, such as the number of escort vehicles to be allowed. These amendments are well thought out and I look forward to the noble Lord. The Minister's response, amendment 403, would require the Secretary of State to establish a regulatory framework to manage the fees charged to hauliers by police forces for escorting a vehicle or trailer carrying a load of exceptional dimensions.

This is an amendment which has industry support. A regulatory framework will ensure that the fees charged by police forces is consistent amongst forces across the country. I know my noble friend has spent much time engaging with industry stakeholders, so I hope the noble Lord Minister takes his remarks and amendment seriously, and I look forward to the government's response on amendment 414. I have to say again, I declare myself as an owner of a shop, and I associate myself completely with the words of my noble friend, the learned Lord gardener, and I will leave it there.

My Lords, I also support the principle behind my noble friends. Amendments 416 and 416M they are, in essence, clarifying amendments that ensure that the scope of the original measure in question is not used for the abuse of police services for personal gain. The provision of special services is a helpful law that chief officers should be able to draw on with discretion, but the compensation for the use of those services should not come at the expense of the police force's integrity.

Compensation should ideally be monetary if necessary. The short term loan of items for specific use as NFS amendment lays out, but my Noble Friends amendment lays out. But it should not be equipment for that personal use. Similarly. Similarly, as my noble friend has said, it should not be the officers making the decision on the use of special police services who gain financially from overtime payments, it should be those actually working overtime. Our noble friend has laid out cases where both of these incidents have happened, and once again, we hear of malpractice in the West Midlands Police force.

My Lords, my noble friend is infinitely more wise than his knowledge on this subject than I am myself. So I will defer to him. But I do hope that the noble Lord, the Minister, can address his undoubtedly well-informed points in depth, especially given the current questions. Certain certain police forces face. I once again thank my noble friend for bringing these amendments forward, and I look forward to hearing both his and the Minister's closing remarks.
18:52
Lord Katz Portrait Lord Katz (Labour)
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My Lords, can I start by >> My Lords, can I start by welcoming the noble Earl, noble Lord, these amendments, and for his engagement with me and officials from the Home Office and the Department for transport on the matter of abnormal loads. I know he matter of abnormal loads. I know he brings huge, abnormally large. Perhaps I should say expertise and certainly expertise that's unique for this house to to to your Lordships House and on these matters. And I do thank him for raising his concerns.

And also, I should say at this point, it's good to hear from my noble friend Lord Falconer of of of Worcester on this bringing his experience, particularly as it pertains to the operation of heritage railways. It's always good. It is not a complete passage of committee in the bill as far as I'm concerned. If I'm not talking to my noble friend Lord Falconer about heritage railways, I've done it a few times before. At least I remember on the Employment Rights Bill act, when it was still a bill, and I and and obviously I note with added respect the noble Lord that these new status as a social media influencer.

And so we should take his words with even greater import on the broader issues raised by these amendments. I am aware the noble Earl has previously written to the DFT with a report that highlighted specific concerns about the interactions between West Midlands heavy haulage in West Midlands Police and the heavy haulage industry. And, he said made comments about the the Chief Constable, which obviously is relevant in around topicality and I think we know what he's talking about and I'll just leave it there.

It doesn't really pertain to the issues that we're talking about with these, these amendments. And I would of course, and whilst that report was appreciated, I would of course. And this will come. No, it may sadden him, but it will come no surprise the noble I would remind noble Lords that the police are operationally independent from government, and therefore individual police forces are responsible for making decisions on vehicle escorts based on an assessment of risks to infrastructure and the safety of all road users.

And as the noble, the noble Lord does acknowledge, the majority of police forces are making those decisions using their operational independence in a way that he is very satisfied with. The final decision in each case is for the relevant chief officer in discussion with interested local parties. This is set out in the public guidance provided by the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency, National Highways and the College of Policing. However, I fully recognise the importance of constructive dialogue on these operational matters and so in that spirit, the Policing Minister and my and I are pleased to be to have arranged a meeting, a further meeting with the noble Lord Earl Attlee, which, as he said, is going to be happening.

I believe it's next week along with the National Policing lead for normal loads. So these concerns can be discussed in more detail. And this will provide an opportunity to ensure that the guidance issued by the PCC is being applied consistently, and that any unintended consequences for the heavy haulage industry are perfectly understood. As a further general observation on these amendments, I want to reassure the noble Earl that the government keeps the Special Types General Order 2003 under regular review to ensure it remains fit for purpose and reflects operational needs and legal requirements, and where improvements are necessary.

These can be made via an amending order using existing powers under section 44 of the Road Traffic Act 1988. And this approach, My Lords, ensures that any changes are subject to the established processes for regulatory scrutiny, including impact assessments and public consultation, and I hope that provides the reassurance that the noble Lady Baroness Pidgeon was was seeking in her remarks. In addition, I'd like to acknowledge the representations made by the Heavy Transport Association on this matter in support of the noble order that these amendments, the government recognises the importance of the abnormal load in heavy haulage industry to the UK economy and its critical role in delivering major infrastructure projects across the country, be it in transport or civil engineering or house building.

We as a government are committed to growth and this is an important part of delivering that commitment. In recognition of this, the government has supported the efforts made by the MPC to standardise policing practice from abnormal loads, and we strongly encourage police forces across the country to make full use of the new guidance on abnormal loads. And that was published by the MPC in May last year. To ensure that abnormal load hauliers receive a consistent service from the police, no matter where they are operating from.

Given this ongoing work to support the industry by the MPC, I would contend to your Lordships House that we should allow sufficient time for the new guidance to bed in before considering whether changes to the 2003 order are needed. This guidance is due to be reviewed in May 2027. As to the specifics of these amendments, as the noble Lord Earl has explained, amendment 403 seeks to confirm the police a power to make traffic regulation dispensation orders which would allow a normal load drivers to break normal traffic rules in order to negotiate their chosen route.

And while I understand the intention behind this proposal, the government is not persuaded that it's necessary. Traffic authorities already have the power to make traffic regulation orders under the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984, and these can provide for precisely the situations described. The government's view is that traffic management should remain the responsibility of traffic authorities, who are best placed to consider the wider implications for road safety and network efficiency. Giving this power to the police would blur responsibilities and could lead to inconsistent decision making.

The government is also unpersuaded of the case for repealing provision in the Police Reform Act 2002, that allows the police to accredit certain persons with limited powers to control traffic for the purpose of escorting abnormal loads. Removing. Removing this power would mean that only police officers could direct traffic during these movements. The Noble Order has suggested that fewer accreditations have been made by chief officers utilising these powers, and whilst that may be the case where such designations have been made, it's inevitably the case that the repeal of these provisions would shift the burden back onto warranted police officers, reduce flexibility in managing abnormal movements, and lead to delays and higher costs for the haulage industry.

These movements often support major infrastructure projects and time sensitive logistics, so any additional delays could have serious economic consequences. And we say the current system strikes a sensible balance by allowing accredited persons to assist us under police oversight, ensuring safety whilst avoiding unnecessary demands on police time. Turning now to the group of amendments relating to charges levied by the police for escorting abnormal loads, amendments 413 and 5026 require the Secretary of State to establish a regulatory framework for fees charged by police forces, whilst further amendment 414416D details how payments should be made, received, and amendment 416 seeks to prevent individuals who could be financially impacted by a decision concerning escorting and abnormal load from being involved in that decision.

My Lords, whilst I recognise the aim of these amendments is to improve consistency and predictability to operators moving such loads, we do not believe such a statutory framework is necessary. Furthermore, a national framework for charging escorting these loads also exists. Section 25 of the Police Act 1996 contains a power for the police to recharge the costs of policing that has been requested by an individual or organisation. Fee levels are set out in MPC guidance on special police services and updated annually, introducing a standardised regulatory framework as envisaged in amendment 413 would also risk undermining the ability of forces to respond flexibly, flexibly and proportionately to local needs.

The operational demands placed on police forces by abnormal movements can differ across the country, influenced by a range of local factors including geography, road infrastructure, traffic conditions and the availability of police resources. My Lords, we understand the desire for transparency in how these charges are paid as proposed by 460. However, should clarification be required on these matters, these issues are better addressed through guidance rather than through prescriptive primary legislation. Mandating bank transfers as sole payment route is unnecessarily rigid given established public sector financial controls, audited accounts and existing mechanisms for receiving forces and police and crime, commissioners should retain the proportionate flexibility to use approved payment routes the proposals prohibit.

Loaning of equipment could also risk creating barriers to collaboration between policing and industry. Similarly, the amendment the intention of amendment 416, which seeks to ensure individuals who may be financially impacted by decision making on escorting abnormal loads, are not involved in that decision making is logical, but again, it's better covered for the practice. And now I'll turn lastly, I think to the more rather more contentious amendment 414. And I want to reassure the noble Lord, Lord Garnett, and also the, the, the noble, the noble Lord, Lord Davis, that the government would definitely not be accepting this amendment.

But I do understand the noble Lord intentions in putting it very much as a very, very, you know, probing amendment to very much make the point about the different the different free fee systems. I mean, I would say that the government is committed to conducting more regular reviews of firearms licensing fees in the future to ensure that fees keep pace with costs to address the particular point he made about that fee regime. But I would, to his more substantive point in tabling this probing amendment, say that firearms licensing is, I would contend, very different from the task of escorting abnormal loads.

While the former lends itself to a nationally prescribed set fees, the latter does not, given that the level of police resources required to escort abnormal loads will vary significantly depending on the circumstances. That said, there does need to be a consistency in the approach for to charging for escorts as between forces based on the principle of full cost recovery. And as I've as I've indicated, the MPC guidance provides for that. So in conclusion, and having said all this together, I, together with the Policing Minister, Mr.

Jones, look forward to the further meeting we're having next week with the noble Lord and also the the MPC lead on the on on the issue to discuss these issues ahead of the Report stage. So for now, given the hour, I'd ask the noble Lord to

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withdraw his amendment. I'm grateful for the response of all noble Lords, including the all noble Lords, including the Minister on the MPC guidance. A lot of work was done by Chief of work was done by Chief Superintendent Mark clothier of the National Police Chiefs Council. Done a great job. He's highly Done a great job. He's highly regarded in the industry, a lot of collaboration with industry and
19:02
Earl Attlee Portrait Earl Attlee (Conservative)
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collaboration with industry and about 35 police forces are strictly adhering to the guidance. The problem is that a few are not. And the Minister, as he admitted, has no power to tell police forces what they should be doing. The only way the Minister can do it is by agreeing my amendment 413. My Lords, the Minister said quite correctly that we can amend the 2003 order if necessary, but that order is made under section 44 of the Road Traffic Act, and all it does is allow the Minister to make an order to allow the movement of a load that can't comply with the construction and use regulations.

It won't allow the Minister to make an order about charging regimes or the relaxation of traffic regulations, Mr. said pointed out or thought that my amendment 413 wouldn't be would have no flexibility. It does actually have a provision for flexibility where, if it's necessary in certain circumstances to diverge from any regulations, you can go back to the Secretary of State, in other words, the Home Office official, and get permission to do something slightly different. But I'm very grateful to the response to the Minister, and I do hope we can have a successful meeting next week.

In the meantime,

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I beg leave to withdraw my amendment. Pleasure that this amendment be withdrawn. Amendment is by leave withdrawn. Amendment is by leave withdrawn 43A not moved amendment withdrawn 43A not moved amendment 404 are not moved. Amendments 405 to 410 have been withdrawn.

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Yes. To move the House be resumed.

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To move the House be resumed. Question is that the House be resumed? As many as that opinion shall say. Content and the contrary shall say. Content and the contrary

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not content. The contents have it. My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now adjourn.
10:30
None Portrait Introduction(s): Baroness Hyde of Bemerton; Lord Roe of West Wickham
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