(2 years, 7 months ago)
Lords ChamberMy Lords, I cannot discuss matters of nationality and borders without confessing that this is extremely personal territory for me, as I know it is for others in your Lordships’ House. It is personal territory because I am the daughter of migrants to this country—hard-working people no longer with me and yet with me always. They came, as so many like them did, at the invitation of the late first Earl of Stockton when he was Prime Minister.
In my working life as a human rights lawyer, first in the home department and subsequently outside it, I have seen time and again the manner in which Governments and politicians of all stripes have eroded the hard-won rights of refugees in particular, and how dog-whistle politics around immigration has toxified race relations and undermined race equality, even to the detriment of British people whose migration stories go multiple generations back. So these are issues as much of equality and common decency as of nationality and borders.
The Bill has a patriotic title. The use of the word “borders” is surprisingly colourful for parliamentary counsel: it could have been taken directly from a campaigning slogan. I have no objection to nationality or borders, but I must observe that neither Covid nor climate catastrophe respects either very much. A truly global Britain would cherish the refugee convention as a central pillar of the post-war international settlement once promoted by Britain and would not seek to dilute it. The Dunkirk spirit is about saving people in little boats, not turning them around. So soon after the still incompletely resolved Windrush scandal, we would be wise indeed to give the most anxious scrutiny to any two-tier system of rights to refuge or nationality.
Clause 9 has rightly caused outrage in civil society—if not sufficient media coverage or even debating time in the other place. To deprive a national of that status without notice should be beyond the contemplation of any civilised society that cares about rights and freedoms in general and due process in particular. A nation’s citizens are its responsibility and are not to be dumped like waste, even or especially on the vague and subjective grounds of security, diplomatic relations or
“otherwise in the public interest.”
That the Government are bound by international law not to render people stateless ensures that this provision must inevitably be applied in a racist fashion, with the Executive determining without public scrutiny, judicial involvement or even notice to the individual concerned that they are of a category of British citizen who may potentially qualify for nationality somewhere else, regardless of whether such nationality has even been applied for, let alone granted. No wonder this provision has inspired fear and loathing in our minority communities in particular.
Even the subject heading of Clause 11 sends a chill to the bones, with its “Differential treatment of refugees”. To penalise and even criminalise desperate people in any way for the manner in which they make their escape from persecution to the UK is to violate the letter and the spirit of the refugee convention, which was in no small part the world’s apology for some of the darkest moments in the history of the last century. The Bill attempts to redefine Article 31, thereby ripping up years of interpretation by specialist judges so as to grant only second-class protection to the majority of refugees.
These are but two of the myriad objections to this measure. I say that as an advance apology to noble Lords opposite for the many long nights and longer nightmares to come.
(2 years, 8 months ago)
Lords ChamberMy Lords, this group of amendments and the related clauses address the phenomenon that those unfortunate enough to have experienced it call digital strip-searching—the practice of demanding a complainant’s device, usually a mobile phone, in the police station in return for agreeing to pursue a criminal investigation, usually into an alleged sex offence such as rape.
I begin by thanking the Minister for taking the problem seriously and understanding the need to address it via statute. I am afraid that I remember Ministers standing at that Dispatch Box even a couple of years ago, denying that the practice was problematic, widespread or disproportionate and even arguing against the need for primary legislation—so-called consent, in exchange for a vindication of one’s fundamental right to an investigation into such a serious crime, being sufficient. Mansplaining to rape survivors is bad enough; “Baronsplaining”, if I may call it that, was a new level of insensitivity.
I will not insult the empathy of your Lordships’ House by reiterating why an extraction of data from a personal smartphone or computer is one of the most intimate searches in the modern era and can leave the complainant feeling more like a suspect, even if the extraction is swift and on the spot and takes no more data than is strictly necessary to the particular investigation. That successive Governments, DPPs and police leaders have failed to address this problem must have played at least some part in our appalling attrition rates for the prosecution of sex offences.
While this part of the Bill is a much-needed attempted correction, we would not need to amend it if survivor and human rights groups had been properly consulted. I declare an interest as a council member of the all-party group, Justice. Amendments 43 to 46, 48 and 51 in my name are advanced by a broad coalition of civil society organisations, led by Big Brother Watch, Amnesty International, the Centre for Women’s Justice and Rape Crisis. They are currently unconvinced that the Bill, either as it stands or with proposed government amendments, does enough to protect complainants and rebuild trust in the investigation and prosecution of sex offences.
Amendments 43 and 44 allow the complainant to be present during the extraction of data, unless that is impracticable or inappropriate, and create a time limit for any police retention of the device. Amendment 45 would make the threshold for extraction the tighter and objective ECHR test of strict necessity, and Amendment 46 would further tighten the criteria. Amendment 48 would allow a DCI review of the strict necessity of any extraction agreement, and Amendment 51 requires a fuller explanation of the person’s rights before they agree. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Paddick. Crucially, his Amendment 50 ensures that the explanation is given orally, as well as in writing. My noble friend Lord Rosser’s Amendment 52A makes provision for data in the hands of a third party.
Government Amendment 52 in the Minister’s name creates a proportionality but not a strict necessity test for extraction where the authorised person is of the subjective view that there is a risk of obtaining confidential information—of course there is. Amendments 53 to 56 replace the need for regulations with the laying of statutory guidance.
The government provision still contains fewer statutory safeguards than sought by the victims’ rights coalition, so I urge the Minister to move further in its direction by accepting its amendments, refining or tweaking them at Third Reading or, at the very least—and before the preparation of any statutory guidance under the new legislation—agreeing to meet with a small group of those representing voices that have been ignored for too long. I beg to move.
My Lords, I am ready to support the commitment of the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, in bringing forward this amendment, and appreciative of the Minister’s moves as represented in the government amendments. I simply want to clarify some points, because there are still concerns in this area. Some of the concerns arise from the context.
Police abuse of procedures of various kinds has been apparent, even to the extent of affecting murder victims. It cannot be denied that within police forces there are a few people who will do these things. That makes it that much more difficult to have complete confidence in the voluntary arrangements that these amendments deal with. I ask the questions: how voluntary, how confidential, and how about disclosure?
How voluntary? When someone is asked to hand over their phone, the police officer usually says, “It’s up to you but unless you hand over your phone to me, I can’t see the Crown Prosecution Service having enough material to take this case forward, and I think that would probably be the end of your attempt to get justice”. I am paraphrasing, but that might effectively be what he says. That means the safeguards are important, and I welcome them, but will they be sufficient?
How confidential? Government Amendment 49 says “confidential” has the meaning it has in Amendment 47, but Amendment 47 does not actually define “confidential”. Clearly, on somebody’s phone there is a great range of confidentiality: from what might be a conversation about an intimate relationship through to a bank account, a family row or something else that someone regards as in need of safeguarding and treating as confidential. We need to be a little clearer about that.
What about disclosure? Can the Minister say a little about to what extent, if any, the requirement of disclosing material to the defence is affected by these provisions? That puts a further pressure, of course, on the victim of the crime, but it is an essential part of our justice system that when evidence is found that would assist the defence, it is the duty of the prosecution to hand it over. These are the points that concern me.
I am grateful to all noble Lords who spoke in this short debate. What a great team, and a model of brevity, clarity and compassion, if I may say so. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Beith, for his rhetorical prods, which highlighted why “strict necessity” should be the operable test here—and, of course, the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, for reiterating disclosure obligations and the nature of the abuse that has been taking place in this area for too long. He was the first to crystallise the intimate nature of the virtual world, which was echoed by the right reverend Prelate and the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, among others—thus making it so important that the police explain not just this material and what is going to happen to it but what the process will be thereafter, including potentially court.
The noble Baroness, Lady Jones, ever succinctly and pithily, pointed to the Hobson’s choice with which too many complainants have been presented up to now, and I know that the Minister understands that. The noble Lord, Lord Paddick, should never suggest that he has not been on the ball in relation to this group or any part of the Bill. He has been the most diligent of all the very senior retired police officers in your Lordships’ House on these matters. I am also grateful to my noble friend Lord Ponsonby for making the case so clearly in relation to third-party material; it will clearly need to be returned to in relation to the victims Bill. I am glad that the Minister does not want the police and CPS just to wait for that. It is about trying to improve things immediately; they have been too dilatory in this area for too long.
I shall not respond to each answer that the Minister so graciously offered, save to say that I am not totally persuaded. If anything, some of her answers actually pointed to the wisdom of these amendments. For example, she mentioned a number of times the principle of last resort before this material should be sought from a complainant. That is strict necessity—not the softer approach of necessity and proportionality, and I do not understand why that higher test should not be replicated. It is great that it is in data protection legislation, but why should it not, as a matter of good law and good governance, be in this legislation?
However, I shall not be churlish, because in both the tone and substance of her remarks, the Minister has been such a contrast on this issue with those who have sat there before her. While warmly accepting her invitation to meet with her later and the various organisations, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
(2 years, 9 months ago)
Lords ChamberWhen certain events happen, it is very clear that domestic abuse increases. I am thinking of big football matches and other such things that may lead to excessive drinking. There is no doubt that there is a correlation.
My Lords, it is very nice to be able to congratulate the Minister on securing the distinguished legal services of Dame Elish Angiolini as chair of the Sarah Everard inquiry. I remain concerned that it is a non-statutory inquiry, given the lack of co-operation with the Daniel Morgan inquiry and the need to subpoena not just present police officers but former ones. Can the Minister confirm that the decision about whether it is converted into a full statutory inquiry will remain with Dame Elish, not with the department or the Home Secretary?
The noble Baroness will know that it is purely a Home Secretary decision. I think the other thing she will acknowledge is that in Dame Elish we have a highly respected, highly competent individual to lead the inquiry.
(2 years, 9 months ago)
Lords ChamberIf the Committee will allow, I can answer some of these questions. We intend to have an Order of Consideration Motion so that, on Report, items will be taken as much as they can be in the same order as they are in Committee—so there will be plenty of time to consider these matters. We have discussed, in the usual channels, how the arrangements for this Bill should take place. I completely accept that it might go quite late tonight. We have spent a lot of time on this Bill—I accept that. But this is the Committee stage, and it cannot go on for ever because, if it goes on and on, the House of Lords looks as if it is preventing the Bills that have been passed by the House of Commons from going ahead.
The noble Lord shakes his head. As my noble friend the Minister has said, there has been ample time to talk about this Bill—and all we are saying is that, after three extra days, we have to draw this to a conclusion at some stage. This is not an unreasonable number of amendments to deal with—we have often done this in the past. The key, of course, is that we actually get on with it and that noble Lords have a view to the rest of the Members of this House. None of us wants to stay up too late. It is perfectly doable to have this number of groups—we have done it before—if noble Lords are able to be brief and succinct and make their point.
On the government amendments, the idea of having them in Committee is that we can debate them today. My noble friend has said that she will withdraw them, and that allows Report to go ahead—and, if necessary, noble Lords can vote on them.
My Lords, I do not want to elongate this procedural debate before a lengthy debate that we are debating the length of, but the protest provisions in this Bill have been some of the most contentious—and not just in your Lordships’ House but in the country. They are not the final provisions or the final part of this Bill, even, yet they have been saved for the latter stages of this Committee, and the later hours of this last day will include this raft of new and even more contentious amendments. That is the reason for this suspicion and the concern that your Lordships’ House has not been shown the appropriate respect of a second Chamber in a democracy, when dealing with provisions that are, arguably, contrary to the human rights convention, and are certainly thought to be very contentious and illiberal by many communities in this country.
Something that we did last week was to start early. Why could we not start earlier today so that we did not need to go into the early hours of the morning? We could have started at 10, which would have been a reasonable start for most people.
My intention was not to leave out that issue; we could have a whole debate on the effect of childhood abuse, trauma and witnessing violence on the future prospects of a person when they become an adult and their increased likelihood of going on to abuse, but my intention was not to dismiss it. I apologise that I did not mention it, but the intention certainly was not to dismiss it at all.
Finally, I move to the amendments in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Best. As I said, the time has come to reconsider the Vagrancy Act—some of the language that was used is so antiquated that it would perhaps be alien to some of this generation. I agree that nobody should be criminalised just because they have nowhere to live. Back in 2018, we committed to review the legislation following mixed views among stakeholders regarding the continued relevance of the Act, given that it is, as noble Lords have said, nearly 200 years old. I am sure that noble Lords can understand that announcing the outcome of this review has been delayed by several factors. One noble Lord mentioned the dedicated response for vulnerable individuals who are sleeping rough during the pandemic, which was outstanding.
It has been imperative to understand the full picture of how and why the Vagrancy Act is used, and what impact any change to or repeal of the Act will have. Rough sleeping and begging are complex issues, and the Act continues to be used. The review considered a range of factors and at its heart has been the experiences and perceptions of relevant stakeholders, including local authorities and the police. The Act continues to be used to tackle begging, and, if repealed, a legislative gap would be left that might impact on the police’s ability to respond to it.
The Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014 is not an alternative in this context. The powers in the Act are available to police and local authorities to tackle specific forms of behaviour that meet the legal tests in that legislation—for example, behaviour that is likely to cause harassment, alarm or distress to a victim or community. As I have said, begging is complex, but plainly it does not always come with these forms of accompanying behaviours.
I did not speak earlier to save the Committee’s time and please the Government Whips, but I now have two short questions in relation to the Minister’s answer.
When I voiced my support for something needing to be done about the Vagrancy Act, there was a general acknowledgement that something needs to be done about it. I extend the invitation to the noble Lord, Lord Best—and, indeed, to my noble friend as well if he so wishes—because it would be an important discussion ahead of the next stage. What I was trying to say in my rather long-winded explanation is that there are some complex things in the Vagrancy Act that need to be unpicked and understood, with consideration of the legislation on the back of that.
I hope that this is an appropriate time for me to ask the Minister two questions in relation to her answer on this group.
First, in contrast with the Minister’s answer to the subsequent amendment in the name of my noble friend Lady Armstrong of Hill Top, the answer to Amendment 292H in the name of my noble friend Lady Blake seemed to be that there are adequate powers for local authorities and the police to work together to protect people from unlawful eviction. However, there is obviously a difference between powers and duties. The intention behind this neat and compelling amendment is to do what the Government have tried to do in other aspects of this draft legislation: create a duty for people who already have powers to prioritise a problem and work together. Why not prioritise protection from eviction in the way that other types of crime have been prioritised, with duties and not just powers, in other parts of the Bill?
Secondly, I listened carefully to the Minister’s answer on vagrancy. I do not understand why, if begging is not causing harassment to people, it is a crime at all. The Minister talked about two sides of the begging problem: it is bad for the person who has to do it and potentially bad for the people who experience it. If it is bad for the people who experience it, there are, as the noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst, set out, adequate criminal laws, whether in anti-social behaviour or in other legislation, that cover unwanted harassment. If it is just about protecting people from unhealthy behaviours, we do not do that by criminalising people for being desperate and poor. When she meets her noble friends to discuss this amendment, will the Minister look at whether this review cannot be speeded up in time for Report? The Government seem able to move very quickly when it comes to adding extra powers to suppress protests, but it takes hundreds of years to repeal the Vagrancy Act.
I am sure that, when my noble friend and the noble Lord, Lord Best, meet Minister Hughes, they will cover some of the points made by the noble Baroness.
I do not think that this is about an acknowledgement that there are adequate powers; it is about the application of those powers. As I said to the noble Baroness, if there are deficiencies in collaboration at the local level, it would be helpful if they were brought to my attention.
In response to that and in support of the broad thrust of my noble friend Lord Coaker’s probing amendment—I think it is fair to call it that—I have long had concerns about public space protection orders in general, and I defer to no one as a civil libertarian, but there is a great tradition in human rights thinking for child protection. So my instinctive response to the noble Baroness is that it is not because the protesters are anti-vaxxers and I disagree with them, it is that it is at school. They are young and potentially vulnerable people, and it does not seem proportionate or fair to me that we as grown-up legislators in this place take greater protection for our immediate vicinity than we give to even primary school children up and down the country, regardless of the nature of the protest.
The point about free speech and freedom to protest being a two-way street is incredibly important, and I suspect that we will return to it in a forthcoming group, but on this issue, for me, at least, the principle is not that I think that this is dangerous speech or disinformation—it is out there anyway online, et cetera—it is that no young person, particularly a very young person, should be subject to an aggressive demonstration, whether or not it is one that I would approve of, on their way to or from school.
Some of us remember the Holy Cross school dispute in Northern Ireland some years ago. The reason why Her Majesty’s Government had to intervene with soldiers, and so on—it was tragic—was not to take sides in the dispute, it was to protect young children, who do not have the same robustness as an older person and should not feel scared on their way to or back from school. I would take that view whether or not the protest by adults from outside the school community was one with which I agreed—about the climate catastrophe or whatever else it happened to be.
It is so important at this stage in the evening, before we get to the next group, to introduce the concept of the two-way street in relation to free speech. So I support my noble friend Lord Coaker in the thrust of his amendment, about schools being special—particularly primary schools, but possibly also secondary schools; that will be up for more detailed discussion—and needing some level of protection from whatever kind of protest by people from outside the school community.
I add that caveat because I think children should be able to protest themselves if they want to. I would not want inadvertently to do anything that caused criminal sanction for children and young people who chose to launch their own protest about whatever it was.
I see this very much as a probing amendment, but the status quo, whereby we have these protections as legislators in the vicinity around the Palace of Westminster —and companies have greater protections from pickets than primary school children have from aggressive demonstrations from whatever quarter—does not seem right. Human rights principles are: always protect children first, and any interference then has to be necessary and proportionate. But equal treatment and the two-way street, particularly in relation to freedom of speech and the right to protest, are crucial.
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, who moved the amendment, which is about the need for fast-track exclusion zones around schools to prevent, in particular, anti-vaccination protests in the vicinity of schools.
If she will allow me, I said to the noble Baroness, Lady Fox of Buckley, I think after we finished on Monday night, how important it is to have her voice in the Chamber to test these sorts of issues. All I would say to her on this occasion is that the amendment talks about “activities carried on” that have
“a detrimental effect on the quality of life for pupils and staff”.
So it is not simply a question of banning any demonstration in the vicinity of a school. It would have to have that detrimental effect. I understand that that is a subjective judgment, but at least there is something there, rather than just a blanket ban on anybody protesting about anything at all.
Noble Lords will not need me to tell them that this is not about protecting children, perhaps older school-age children, from not being vaccinated. It is about protecting the whole community because, as we know from previous times in the pandemic, there is a risk of schoolchildren infecting vulnerable parents and grandparents. We also know from the health data that being double-vaccinated does not necessarily protect you completely from the worst effects of Covid, and in particular long Covid, although it gives you much better protection. On the news yesterday, an expert was talking about the fact that, although Covid has mild effects on children, it is not known how much they could be affected by long Covid. So this is not simply about a demonstration outside a school; this is a wider public health issue. However, I understand that, although that is what the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, is aiming at here, the amendment, if passed, would have wider implications than just for anti-vaccination protests.
Amendment 292S, from the noble Lord, Lord Bassam of Brighton, relates to online racism against footballers and enabling football banning orders to be made against those guilty of online racial hatred directed at a member of a football team. He is probably the best-qualified noble Lord to talk on this issue, bearing in mind his experience on the Front Bench in the Home Office under the Labour Government who introduced the banning orders in the first place, and the beneficial effect that they have had in rooting out racism in football. It is a serious problem.
Talking about a hierarchy of diversity is fraught with danger. But, as a gay man, I have always considered racism to be a far more serious issue than, say, homophobia. Some people might argue against this; but I could conceal my sexuality if people from a different planet did not know who I was or what my background was. But you cannot hide your colour; you cannot avoid racism in the way that some gay people, at least, could avoid homophobia; it would not be obvious to people.
I do not know of any professional footballers who have been open about their sexuality, because of their concerns about being open about it. Hopefully, as years go by and social attitudes change, some professional footballers will be open about their sexuality. They should be able to benefit from similar protection, so this legislation should not exclusively provide protection for racism, which is the major issue at the moment, while professional footballers’ sexuality is not. This is a good idea, and hopefully the Government will discuss how this can be taken forward.
This group is diverse—not in the sense of “diversity,” but in terms of the different subjects covered. Amendment 292U, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Faulkner of Worcester, highlights a loophole in the law. My understanding—although I am not sure as there was no explanatory note—is that it is unlawful for scrap metal dealers to pay cash for scrap metal, but it is not against the law to sell it on for cash. That is the loophole. A scrap metal dealer who surreptitiously acquires stolen metal could sell it on for cash, and the noble Lord’s amendment would disallow that. The payment would have to be made by a traceable means, thus clamping down in the other side of the transaction, which makes sense.
We have debated the issue of scrap metal and the impact on the railway system and churches, for example, and the problem with catalytic converters. As shortages of resources are exacerbated by countries coming out of lockdown and the demand for raw materials grows, scrap metal will become an increasingly important issue. Therefore, closing this loophole regarding the other side of the transaction seems sensible, and we support it.
My Lords, I have a duty, first, and then, I hope, the privilege to make some comments of my own. My noble friend Lord Hendy is unable to be here to speak to his Amendment 304, so, if the Committee does not mind, I will read his remarks in support of that before I make a few remarks of my own on this group.
He says the following: he is grateful to my noble friend Lord Hain for adding his name to the amendment and to me for reading these remarks. The Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee, under the excellent chairmanship of the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, on which he has the privilege to serve, criticised in its report of 13 September Clauses 55, 56 and 61 of the Bill for the surrender of the definition of certain phrases to delegated legislation, thus bypassing the full scrutiny of primary legislation.
At Second Reading, the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, emphasised that his committee took no position on the substantive provisions but recognised that they are contentious and should therefore be in the Bill. My noble friend Lord Hendy goes on to say that he and many other noble Lords supported that argument, but the Government have not taken heed of this criticism, and the power remains to define by secondary legislation some very contentious phrases in these sections.
I continue to support the committee and the amendments brought by noble Lords—particularly that of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge—to obviate this procedural but fundamental flaw, but Amendment 304 goes beyond the procedural to the substance of Clause 56. That clause will be the basis for yet further restriction on the right to picket in an industrial dispute. That is objectionable because the right to picket, still extant in UK law, is already constrained in law in multiple ways which go far beyond those imposed on other kinds of public assembly. Further restrictions on the right are simply not warranted. It would be tedious to review the law on picketing today. Suffice to say, it is already highly regulated by statute, case law and its own code of practice.
By the Conspiracy, and Protection of Property Act 1875, 146 years ago, it ceased to be a criminal offence to attend
“at or near the house or place where a person resides, or works, or carries on business, or happens to be, or the approach to such house or place, in order merely to obtain or communicate information”,
although the use of violence, intimidation, damage to property, persistent following, watching and besetting were all made statutory offences. From this beginning, the right to picket was established. It has been further restricted many times since, including by the outlawing of picketing of domestic premises. The current formula is Section 220 of the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992. It reads:
“It is lawful for a person in contemplation or furtherance of a trade dispute to attend … at or near his own place of work, or … if he is an official of a trade union, at or near the place of work of a member of the union whom he is accompanying and whom he represents, for the purpose only of peacefully obtaining or communicating information, or peacefully persuading any person to work or abstain from working.”
The Act defines both “place of work” and a “trade dispute”.
I should add in relation to the latter, in case any of your Lordships were unaware of it—which I doubt—that collective action
“in contemplation or furtherance of a trade dispute”
will not be lawful without the prior fulfilment of many statutory conditions. These include service of a highly complex notice of ballot on every relevant employer; a ballot in favour, which must conform with complicated and demanding thresholds on turnout and majority; and service of an equally complex notice of industrial action on every relevant employer. There are many provisions regulating all this in detail and many other requirements, such as the provision of mandatory qualified scrutineers, full postal balloting—no workplace or electronic voting is permitted—and so on.
Case law has held that Section 220 on the right to picket does not protect against private nuisance—interfering with someone’s enjoyment or use of land—nor against public nuisance in the form of violence, intimidation, molestation, excessive numbers, obstruction, blockade or an unreasonable obstruction of the highway. There is no exemption from the criminal law or the law of trespass, so this is all covered.
The Code of Practice on Picketing—the latest edition of which is from 2017—is taken into account by the courts and runs to 19 detailed pages of guidance. The code provides, among many other things, that
“pickets and their organisers should ensure that in general the number of pickets does not exceed six at any entrance to, or exit from, a workplace; frequently a smaller number will be appropriate.”
In consequence, a requirement that there be no more than six persons on a picket line is applied as though it was statute law by both the police and the courts.
As if that is not enough, the Trade Union Act 2016 imposed yet further restrictions. The union must appoint a picket supervisor to supervise the picketing. They must be an official or other member of the union familiar with the code of practice and have taken reasonable steps to tell the police their name, where the picket is to take place and how they can be contacted. The picket supervisor must be in possession of a letter stating that the picketing is approved by the union, which must be shown to the employer if sought. This is very highly regulated.
The possibility of flying pickets and anything else that any of your Lordships might think requires restraint has already been closed off. Surely all this is enough. Picketing in recent years under this strict legislative regime has not thrown up problems which require further legislative redress, yet Clause 56 will give the police the power, in many sectors, virtually to extinguish life from the remains of this emaciated right.
Among other things, the clause gives power to a senior police officer to impose conditions on an assembly where the officer reasonably believes that noise generated by persons taking part may result in
“serious disruption to the life of the community”
or
“serious disruption to the activities of an organisation which are carried on in the vicinity of the assembly”.
Senior officers seeking the meaning of these phrases will not find them in the Bill, which does not define either. Instead, the Bill will give power to the Secretary of State to create definitions by regulation. We can only guess how the Secretary of State might choose to define these phrases. However, we have a strong steer as to what she currently has in mind, because she has provided a draft set of regulations in relation to the meaning of the phrases. There is not, so far as I can ascertain, a draft of regulations to define
“serious disruption to the activities of an organisation which are carried on in the vicinity of the assembly”,
but the draft regulations that deal with a
“serious disruption to the life of the community”
state:
“It may be regarded by the senior police officer as serious disruption to the life of the community if there is … a significant delay to the supply of a time-sensitive product impacting on the community, or … prolonged physical disruption to access to essential goods and services impacting on the community.”
They go on to say that a
“‘time-sensitive product’ includes newspapers and perishable items”
and
“‘essential goods and services’ means … the supply of money, food, water, energy or fuel … a system of communication … a transport facility … a place of worship … an educational facility … a service relating to health, or … another critical public service.”
If pickets in a trade dispute are successful in persuading workers not to cross the picket line, it is obvious that, depending on the nature of the employer’s business, picketing may involve significant delay to the supply of time-sensitive products or prolonged physical disruption to access to essential goods and services. Accordingly, under Clause 56, the assiduous senior police officer may well impose conditions on workers who legitimately but noisily picket their place of work in order to persuade others not to work during a lawful industrial dispute in relevant sectors. Such relevant sectors will be where the workplace is involved in the production or delivery of food, water, power, railways, buses, places, lorries, ships, newspapers, mail, TV, radio, film, education, health, local government and so on. It is hard to think of many workplaces at all that will not be included.
Though the Explanatory Notes to the Bill do not expressly refer to picketing in an industrial dispute, it is plain that these draft regulations have given the game away. Clause 56 is precisely aimed at picketing in a lawful industrial dispute, whatever other assemblies may also be impacted. Accordingly, Amendment 304 proposes to exclude lawful picketing—subject to all of that regulatory regime that my noble friend Lord Hendy sets out—in legitimate trade disputes from these additional restraints. The Minister is invited to agree the amendment in order to exempt picketing from this intended regime, given that it is so closely regulated.
I am grateful to the Committee for its patience in listening to my noble friend Lord Hendy’s rationale for Amendment 304. Perhaps I may be indulged in making just a few comments of my own about this whole group. I shall try not to hyperbolise but do my best to disagree well with the noble Baroness opposite. I do not think that noble Lords who have spoken and expressed their concern so far have hyperbolised. Let me try to explain why some of us are so desperately concerned about the impact on freedom of expression and freedom of association of Part 3 of this draft legislation.
If we take existing tests, there is so much law already on the statute book, some of it passed by Conservative Governments, much of it passed by Labour Governments—much of which I objected to at the time, alongside friends of mine in the Conservative Party. I may be wearing a red dress now, but it was not always the case; I hope noble Lords opposite will understand that. Free speech is a two-way street and, in my lifetime, no Government have been perfect when it comes to protecting it.
Respect goes both ways. The Government are not respecting this House.
I am happy to wrap up. I am sorry, I had to read for my noble friend Lord Hendy, who had an amendment, and that took a little time. I beg your pardon; I will be very brief.
I have talked about the past—suffragettes and anti-apartheid, et cetera—and I have talked about Russia and China and the places that we have to persuade, in the current, dangerous world, not to suppress protest. The domestic context is that we have come out of Brexit, which was incredibly divisive; whichever side you were on, we know that it divided communities. I was subject to protesters who were very cross with me, and a little scary, but in the end, I put up with it. We are coming through a pandemic, and people are scared and very worried by climate change. I do not believe that oppressive powers giving this level of discretion to the police to suppress free speech will bring our communities together.
My Lords, if I may, I will speak succinctly on the noise amendments. I appreciated what the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, said about the two-way street, favourite protests and standing up for all protests, but I wonder about the extent to which we are actually doing that. I listened carefully to the persuasive argument made by the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, in introducing the Opposition amendment on fast-track orders for schools. I also listened to the excellent opening speech from the noble Lord, Lord Dubs; if that is the kind of protest which is being restricted, I am sure that a majority in both Houses would vote against it. Opposition Members have spoken in favour of protections around schools, and I can very much see the case for protecting schools. But are we really saying that untrammelled noise cannot be intimidating and unacceptable, in the manner which the Bill attempts to frame as a problem?
Anti-vaxxers outside schools were given as an example. Are we saying that noise should not be a factor if anti-vaxxers are making a sustained attempt to disrupt Covid vaccine clinics? Another entirely feasible example is a far-right protest that was seeking to intimidate council workers using high levels of noise, because the council was volunteering to bring in refugees and a section of that community did not want that.
The question raised by the noble Viscount, Lord Colville of Culross, was pertinent: is existing legislation sufficient to deal with this? I hope that Ministers will address that point when summing up and in bringing the Bill to Report. I am much less comfortable with the rhetoric which simply cites noise as beyond the bounds of regulation in a legal framework. We all know that many protests are noisy—I would imagine that the majority of us in this Chamber have been on such protests—and that is a good thing. But it is surely not what this legislation is intended to debar.
My Lords, my speech can be very quick because I should just like to associate myself with the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe. It was an exceptionally informative and balanced speech about just how difficult these issues are and how difficult the job of the police is to draw that balance and get it right. We should all be extremely grateful that we are policed in such a consensual and high-quality way.
I spoke about this at Second Reading and we have had an exceptionally interesting debate here in Committee. I shall make just a couple of points. First, we ought to avoid, if at all possible, differentiating between good protests, on an issue that I agree with, and bad protests, on an issue that I disagree with. We should resist the temptation to talk about specific causes. The noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, made that point in one of her two speeches; I think that it was the second one.
Forgive me, but I did not make two speeches. I asked the Committee’s permission to read the remarks of my noble friend Lord Hendy because he could not be here to speak to his Amendment 304. I thought that I had the consent of the Committee. If I misunderstood that, I apologise, but I did not intend to make two speeches on my own part.
My Lords, the noble Baroness spoke for nearly 20 minutes and I am attempting to speak for about two minutes.
We ought to avoid drawing the distinction to which I referred. However, there is a clear difference between a lawful expression of protest drawing attention to a particular issue, wanting it to be heard, and a deliberate and aggressive attempt to disrupt the lives of the general public. That is what we have seen over recent weeks. It is entirely reasonable that we look carefully at the current legislative settlement and examine what can be done with the existing powers. I hear the remarks made that the police have the powers that they need. Some feel that they do and others do not. That matter should be carefully looked at.
However, where there are gaps and where the police require additional powers to take those finely balanced judgments, it is entirely legitimate that we look at that in the Bill while maintaining a clear balance and making sure that we do not trespass too much on some of the issues that have been raised around, for example, noise. In essence, there are grounds for a constructive debate and finding that balance. It is never going to get everyone’s support but we all ought to look beyond the Westminster bubble and consider the reaction of the general public when they see their lives and critical national infrastructure such as transport being substantially disrupted and when the police are unable to deal with it effectively.
My Lords, I put my name to Amendment 308 in the name of my noble and learned friend Lord Judge and shall say a few words in support of what he has just said. It was quite clear from the reply by the Minister to the previous group that these words, “serious disruption”, are the key to the proportionality of the clauses that we are considering. They are absolutely central to the whole proportionality of the scheme. Of course, if something does not amount to a serious disruption, the police take no action; if it does amount to that, within the ordinary meaning of the word, the police have authority to do so.
I mention that because, while I support entirely what my noble and learned friend has just said, there is an element of risk here, which I think the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, hinted at in his comments in the last group. It is the risk of lowering the threshold. Why else is the power being taken? If it is not in the present Home Secretary’s mind to lower the threshold, the risk is there. It is for that reason that I suggest there is a risk here that should be avoided.
There is also the point about the clarity of the legislation. One element of the rule of law is that the law should be accessible, and the more you attempt to define words by regulation and not in primary legislation, the more inaccessible the true meaning of the words becomes. It is not a way to go down—it is unnecessary, as my noble and learned friend said—and I hope very much that the Government do not proceed with this scheme.
The noble and learned Lord is exactly right about this constitutional problem, but there is a further point to be made. In this context, it is not just the usual problem of allegedly unclear legislation that is then going to be sorted out by regulation later, and the relationship between the Executive and the legislature not as it should be. It is also in danger of interfering with police operational independence. To be explicit about this, my fear is that the police will take whatever view they take of what this legislation means in certain circumstances and do their best—and if a Home Secretary of the day, even well into the future, thinks that the police are being too lenient towards protesters, or perhaps there is a commotion in the media, regulations will be used further to define what “serious” and “disruption” mean so as to mandate the police effectively to be more heavy-handed than the natural meaning of the words would suggest.
My Lords, I can be relatively brief. Do not worry—it is a temporary blip.
Amendments 298, 308 and 319 question “serious disruption” being decided by the Secretary of State rather than being either defined in the Bill, as my noble friend Lord Beith proposes, or simply left to its natural meaning, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, suggests in his Amendment 308.
My Lords, I apologise. I forgot to speak to five more amendments: Amendments 319Q, 319R, 319S, 319T and 319U, which remove the ability for SDPOs to be renewed.
My Lords, I will be brief and not repeat the valid and chilling points that have already been made. I just say this: for me to even attempt a line-by-line examination of this whole suite of new amendments would result in not just the Leader coming in to censor me again, but me probably being arrested. I am not going to do that, but I will try to say two things that noble Lords have not said yet.
On locking on and in particular going equipped for locking on, and stop and search with or without suspicion of locking on, I am worried not about the glue referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, but about people with bicycle locks. I am worried about young people going about their business, sometimes riding to a demonstration or being in the vicinity of potential demonstrations, carrying bicycle locks. I cannot see how they are not potentially in jeopardy, en masse, of both the stop and search powers, and going equipped.
Secondly, as a former Home Office lawyer and a director of Liberty, to me, this suite of measures, which could be a Bill in itself, looks, smells and tastes a lot like anti-terror legislation of the kind that I have always opposed as being disproportionate and counterproductive. Whether it is the new orders, the stop and search powers, including suspicion, or offences including thought crimes, this new Bill within a Bill looks like some of the anti-terror powers that, when they were introduced, noble Lords opposite and elsewhere, and I and some of my noble friends—forgive me, I hope—looked the other way. Those powers have inspired what we see here, but this time they are not for terrorists but protesters.
My Lords, the Minister gave a powerful justification for upgrading and updating the criminal law to deal with these new forms of protest. She made the point that the general public have had enough, and we recognise that. We have all seen instances of workers begging protesters to let them through to go to work, parents trying to get ill children to hospitals and so on. We have seen frustration turn to fury and people often taking action on their own, dragging protesters away as the police have stood by. At least this section of the Bill makes sense to me based on that motivation, but we have spent hours and hours on previous sections on banning the types of protest in Part 3, which was justified on the basis that it was dealing with those kinds of actions, when in fact none of the measures that we previously discussed would deal with them at all.
The measures that we previously discussed in Part 3 elicited some very fine speeches about the right to protest. I was struck most recently by the speech by the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, which I related to. We were probably on the same miners’ demos. It properly and entirely understood why people were demanding the right to protest. All those fine words were effectively shot down by the Minister on the basis that these are things that we need to do to deal with Extinction Rebellion and these different kinds of protest. In fact, the only dealings that I had when I got caught up in an Extinction Rebellion protest—I mean that I was trying to get through it, rather than that I was on it, in case anyone panics—was when they were doing a five-hour silent vigil in mime. There was no noise involved. But we have spent all that time discussing how noise is going to trigger the police having a huge amount of power to deal with those people.
I find it utterly galling, because now we have a set of amendments, and at least I can understand why the Government have brought them in—and the public will think that they will tackle what they are furious about—and we should therefore, in this House, be able to scrutinise them line by line, as has been explained. People will probably like the locking-on offence—I say “people”, meaning that there might be popular support for it. But the noble Lords, Lord Paddick and Lord Beith, have done a really good take-down of what the consequences of these measures would be beyond the headlines, and people might be less keen on the equipped to lock-on offence. Certainly, when they work out the frightening aspects of the serious disruption prevention orders, they might want to think again. The “causing and contributing to” aspect, as the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, noted, really is a very serious threat to free speech—absolutely. And this is a Government who claim all the time that they are here to defend free speech, but they are introducing, without even casually noting it, something that would absolutely have a damaging effect on free speech.
Maybe I am wrong, and maybe the Government could persuade us that these special kinds of protests need special laws, in which case we should have hours and hours to discuss it. Instead, here we are, fed up, having discussed a whole range of other legislation that was supposed to deal with these issues when in fact, it did not; and now, the things which might deal with those issues we do not have time to discuss. It is frustrating for all of us.
(2 years, 9 months ago)
Lords ChamberMy Lords, we clearly have a division in the House about the merits of this amendment. There are those of us who quite clearly understand the way in which the terms “sex” and “gender” are used and have been used, not just in this country—under several bits of legislation, most importantly the Gender Recognition Act—but also in international law. There is a growing body of international law in which “gender” and “sex” are well understood.
I simply want to ask the noble Lord, Lord Wasserman, to explain three points that he made in his speech. First, he said that the intention of this amendment was to keep the public safe by the accumulation of accurate, appropriate, timely and consistent data. If that data is not aligned with a person’s gender identity, then it will not be accurate, so how can he ask us to accept it? Secondly, he told us that we should not get bogged down in modalities, but this is about a very practical exercise of gathering data, not in a theoretical way and not on the basis of gender-critical beliefs but actually on the basis of people’s lives. Does he not think that this is important enough detail to put into primary legislation? Finally, he said that experience has shown that it was very useful to gather information about sex and gender. Whose experience? Can he give us more information about that?
My Lords, I will speak briefly. I thank all noble Lords who spoke to this. It is a controversial amendment, but I think it has been spoken to quite sensitively, all things considered; maybe it is the lateness of the hour—maybe that was a good move.
I agree with the previous speaker that difficulties in the drafting of an amendment cannot just be dismissed as modalities because when we put forward draft amendments to legislation and say “must” we need to examine what that means. If, as the amendment suggests:
“Police forces in England and Wales must keep a record of the sex registered at birth of each person”,
how is that going to be executed and what will the consequences be? One has to imagine that one is a younger version of the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, in the police station back in the day. People turn up to record whatever it is—a theft, shoplifting, burglary, or a violent offence. How is this recording of the birth sex as well as the subsequently declared gender going to happen and what is the sanction for the “must”? That is not a modality, it is what law requires; there have to be consequences to a “must” being breached. Whatever is really going on, I know there are really sensitive issues in our society at the moment of sex and gender which we will not, I suspect, resolve tonight—we might, but maybe not.
I agreed with my noble friend about the value of data. Whether in the health service or criminal justice system, data is great, but there is another side too, which I think my noble friend acknowledged: that data will put some people off. There are other jurisdictions not far from here where people are really nervous even about declaring their race because of obvious historic reasons for being sensitive about declaring your race at the police station—let alone declaring your birth sex.
We need to see the yin and yang of this particular debate. On the one hand is the brilliant research and analysis of crime we could do if we had more and more data. But on the other hand—and this is not completely different from the previous debate—what we want is victims to come forward and criminal justice to be done. We do not want to do anything that discourages victims from coming forward and reporting crime. That includes people who feel anxious about certain sensitive pieces of information about themselves. We would never want them to put off going to the police station for fear that they say too much. For instance, a person who has been burgled thinking “Was I burgled just because I was burgled, or because I am a trans person? Do I really want to draw more attention to myself because I am an anxious victim of crime?” We need to think about that, let alone the poor old practicalities for a younger version of the very youthful-looking noble Lord, Lord Paddick.
My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, for introducing my speech. This amendment is designed to compel police forces to
“keep a record of the sex registered at birth”
of anyone who is a crime victim or who is arrested by the police for a crime. It also forces the police to
“keep a record of the acquired gender of each person with a gender recognition certificate”
who is a crime victim of crime or is arrested for a crime.
It also says that providing this data to the Secretary of State will not be an offence under the Gender Recognition Act. Again, I want to try to focus on the amendment and not get drawn into the wider debate, as far as I can. As the noble Baroness pointed out, I was a police officer for over 30 years, so I want to look at this from the perspective of the police.
How will a police officer know what the sex registered at birth is—thumbscrews, or a chromosome test—even without the consent of the victim? Maybe they could force victims to give their fingerprints, in the hope that they may have had their fingerprints taken before they transitioned and that will prove it—except they may have had them taken after they transitioned, and that will then show their acquired gender, so that will not work. Will victims have to produce their birth certificates before they are even allowed to report a crime? Of course, if someone has acquired a gender recognition certificate and used it to have their birth certificate changed, as they are legally allowed to do, the birth certificate will show their acquired gender, so that will not work either. How exactly will police forces keep a record of something they do not know and have no reasonable way of finding out unless the victim or perpetrator volunteers the information?
If the victim or the perpetrator is a trans person, they are legally protected from having to disclose that information. “Well, it’s obvious,” some people will say, “you can tell, can’t you?” I have met trans men who you would never believe were assigned female sex at birth and trans women who you would never believe were assigned male sex at birth. I have also, embarrassingly, been with a lesbian friend of mine, assigned female sex at birth and who has always identified as a woman, who was stopped going into a women’s toilet in a top London restaurant because they wrongly thought that she was a man.
The supporters of this amendment may say that if they do find out, maybe the police can record it—that maybe the victim is reporting a transphobic hate crime or for some other reason volunteers that information.
The second part of the amendment is totally unnecessary. Section 22(4) of the Gender Recognition Act 2004 already states:
“But it is not an offence under this section to disclose protected information relating to a person if … (b) that person has agreed to the disclosure of the information”—
for example, if they are the victim of a trans hate crime—or, as stated later in the same section, at paragraph (f),
“the disclosure is for the purpose of preventing or investigating crime”.
So the police can use that information already, without fear of being prosecuted. The amendment is not necessary if the victim or perpetrator volunteers the information.
My noble friend Lady Brinton asked if she would have to declare every time she becomes a victim of crime, even if it is a burglary, that she has a disability? What about me? Will the next step be that I have to tell the police that I am gay before I can report that my flat has been broken into? For what purpose should victims have to out themselves? What if I get caught stealing a bottle of Marks & Spencer Prosecco?
It is very good, actually; I had some on Saturday. I have not tried to do that but if I did, will I have to admit being gay, as well as being a shoplifter?
In 2018, the Government tentatively estimated that there were between 200,000 and 500,000 trans people in the UK. Noble Lords have said they like data; I am going to give them lots of data. Between the Gender Recognition Act coming into force and 2018, 4,910 trans people have been issued with a gender recognition certificate. If we take the top of the range of the estimate, I make that 0.75% of the population identifying as trans and 0.0076% of the overall population having a gender recognition certificate, or less than one in 10,000 people.
Even if a victim went through the whole criminal justice process without disclosing, and without the police establishing the sex assigned to them at birth, if they were a trans woman, it would increase the number of woman victims, and if they were a trans man, it would diminish the number of woman victims, and taken together, and taking account of the total number of trans people, it would even out. Taking into account that only a fraction of them will become victims of crime who report it to the police, any difference to the crime statistics will be statistically insignificant.
The police arrest, on average, 12 in 1,000 people each year—three in 1,000 women. I do not know how many of the estimated 7.5 in 1,000 trans people are trans women and how many are trans men. Of course, if trans women are counted in the female offender figures, they will also be counted in the female population figures, boosting both the numerator and the denominator. I was never any good at mathematics—I left that to my twin brother—but it is quite clear to me that trans people are not going to make any statistically significant difference to the crime figures unless we assume, and there is no factual or statistical basis to think otherwise, that trans people are more likely to commit crime or to commit particular types of crime.
(2 years, 9 months ago)
Lords ChamberTo ask Her Majesty’s Government when the Home Office will publish data on the use of stop and search powers for the year up to April 2021.
My Lords, as announced on GOV.UK on 25 October this year, data on the use of stop and search powers for the year to April 2021 will be published tomorrow.
I am incredibly grateful to the Minister for that. She, like others, will have read newspaper reports just last week conveying suspicions that the data had been suppressed because the police Bill is going through Parliament. Similarly, there are concerns about the Government’s consultation on the Nationality and Borders Bill, the results of which have not yet been published. Will the Minister publish that data as well, certainly before that Bill comes before your Lordships’ House?
My Lords, I am grateful for the opportunity to correct some of the inaccurate claims. The first was that the delay was due to a record level of data, but that was a misrepresentation by journalists; actually, the Home Office needed additional time to quality assure more granular record-level data. Secondly, the decision for delaying the statistics for the PCSC Bill was made by the head of profession, in line with the code of practice for statistics, and was announced at the earliest possible point on GOV.UK.
(2 years, 9 months ago)
Lords ChamberI have a quick question, because I want to be clear about this point in relation to something the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, said earlier. If a Sikh, who is carrying just their religious knife, is in a fight and is convicted of common assault, is the SVRO now available in that context?
It is always dangerous to talk about specific cases but, if the knife has not been used in the commission of the offence—
If the Sikh was going about his business with his knife in his pocket, he would have reasonable excuse. If he then got into a fight and the knife was not used in the commission of the common assault, the knife would be irrelevant to the case. But I must absolutely caveat my comments: the court would decide the facts of the case.
What I am saying, and what I said earlier, is that it will be up to the courts to decide whether it is appropriate, bearing in mind the facts of the case, and whether the court thinks an SVRO in respect of an individual is necessary to protect the public or any particular members of the public in England and Wales.
First, I want to thank the Minister and do not want her to think any of this is meant to be aggressive or to interfere with what she is doing. Secondly, these hypotheticals are incredibly important to test the provisions; they are not some attempt to be clever and dance on the head of a pin. It is super important to get the criminal law right, and that can only be done, in my view, by testing it against the sorts of scenarios being offered.
The Minister quite rightly says, “We are creating a disposal, and in the end the courts will have to administer it”. None the less, the Government are creating the disposal and setting thresholds for its availability. With respect to her, the Government must have a policy and intention, and there is therefore a valid question about whether it is the Government’s intention in drafting and pursuing this legislation that, for example, any male Sikh, or any Sikh, who carries a ceremonial knife, however small, will always theoretically be subject to this additional exposure to a disposal to which, by definition, people of other faiths will not be subject. I am not saying that to be inflammatory, but we have to get this right. The Minister herself has talked about equality impact assessments, and so on. It may be that this proposal slipped through the net and is worth looking at again before the next stage.
This is not just an issue for the Sikh community but for other people such as chefs or electricians who are carrying knives and are involved in a crime that theoretically is potentially not even violent crime but perhaps minor shoplifting, possession of prohibited drugs or whatever. They are now, suddenly, potentially subject to this disposal. It is not simple enough to assume that when a specific disposal such as this one, with draconian consequences, is made available for sentences it would never be used. The courts might rightly think that the Government’s policy must have been that if you carry a blade or point, regardless of whether you were carrying it illegally in the first place, you take your chances, and that if you get involved in shoplifting or is found in possession of drugs, that is too bad—you now get this additional penalty and it serves you right. That is the signal that we are sending on violent crime. I hope that that is not the intention but if it is, the Committee will need to know.
We have covered a spectrum of different types of offending and behaviour. We must not forget that at the point at which—no pun intended—someone is issued with an SVRO, they will have been convicted by the court of a knife or offensive weapons offence. The court will also, I am sure, take into consideration previous patterns of behaviour. If the Sikh who got involved in a fight and had his knife with him had no previous convictions for weapons offending, that would be quite different from a repeat offender. It would be for the court to consider whether to impose the SVRO. I hope that I have made that clear and that it will become clearer to noble Lords by the examples I will provide.
Of course, we will consider, in the light of the Committee, whether we have got all the permutations and combinations right. That is what noble Lords do best—scrutinising legislation, and I have the benefit of some serious legal players around the Chamber.
I now move on to the concerns of the noble Baroness, Lady Armstrong, about the disproportionate impact that SVROs might have on some vulnerable groups—primarily women who might be coerced into carrying weapons. I completely empathise with the circumstances in which such women might find themselves. We discussed domestic violence only a few months ago and know the effect that coercive control can have on women. At the heart of what we are doing is committing to preventing offenders of all ages, genders and backgrounds becoming involved in serious violence by developing resilience, supporting positive alternatives and delivering timely interventions.
(2 years, 9 months ago)
Lords ChamberMy Lords, the UK Government amended the immigration fee regulations in September to give effect to the change, as my noble friend knows. As I previously explained to the noble Lord, Lord Hendy, this is nothing to do with the UK-EU relationship. Our obligations on this matter relate to the implementation of the Council of Europe treaty and do not arise from the UK’s former relationship with the EU or from the TCA.
My Lords, I am conscious that this Question follows one that attracted remarks about the sanctity of a deal done in 1999, but touches on a deal done rather more recently. I ask the Minister how it can make sense for two parties to say that they will honour and implement commitments made under the European Social Charter, but subsequently say that it is perfectly permissible under that deal to disapply and renounce them.
Well, I think I explained our obligations to the noble Lord, Lord Hendy. We continue to place great value on the role of the Council of Europe in advancing work on human rights, democracy and the rule of law across Europe. It has been and will continue to be important to the UK’s human rights and foreign policy agenda.
(2 years, 9 months ago)
Lords ChamberTo ask Her Majesty’s Government what criteria they will use in deciding whether the Home Office inquiry into the matters arising from the murder of Sarah Everard should be converted into a statutory inquiry by way of the Inquiries Act 2005.
My Lords, the Home Secretary, in consultation with the chair, determines that if the inquiry cannot fulfil its terms of reference on a non-statutory footing, it can be converted to a statutory basis.
My Lords, just yesterday we read that the Centre for Women’s Justice is proposing to judicially review the Home Office on this matter, complaining that correspondence with that department has been substantively unanswered from the middle of last month. Does the Minister not agree that the breadth of concern, the depth and importance of the problem, the need for independence to be seen and done and the need, unfortunately, for powers to compel co-operation, all point to every rational criterion for a full Lawrence-style statutory inquiry having already been met?
My Lords, the duty to co-operate is already in place. It has been in place since February 2020. Regarding the Centre for Women’s Justice, we have not ignored the letter. We have been focused on identifying a chair so that the details of the inquiry’s scope and how it will operate can be confirmed as quickly as possible. The inquiry can then start addressing our concerns, those of the public and those of organisations such as the Centre for Women’s Justice. We will respond to them as soon as possible.
(2 years, 9 months ago)
Lords ChamberMy Lords, Amendment 132B—a probing amendment—is in my name and that of my noble friend Lord Hain. The Committee will know that everyone here is engaged with scrutiny of the present Bill because we believe that police powers, criminal justice measures and the criminal law need to be on a clear and, for the most part, statutory footing—certainly on a clear legal footing. A brief skim of this very hefty piece of legislation will throw up references to well-established and legendary Acts of Parliament. The Police and Criminal Evidence Act is an obvious one, as is the Public Order Act; the list goes on. These measures, over the years, have come to govern police powers in particular: powers of arrest, investigatory powers, and so on.
However, because we are nearly a quarter into the 21st century, so much technological development—some of it just as intrusive as traditional powers of arrest and subsequent investigatory powers—has proceeded apace. I, for one, despite having been around this territory for a couple of decades, am not clear about the statutory footing for much of it. That is really the legal and constitutional basis for this probe, if I might put it like that. In a moment, my noble friend Lord Hain will use a more specific example that spurred us to table this amendment, even though that was only a couple of days ago.
In a sense, this is not that dissimilar to the amendment that the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, and many of his friends on the Benches opposite debated a few days ago. That was about non-crime information sitting around on databases, potentially to the detriment of citizens. His cry then, supported vociferously by people from across the Committee, but particularly that side, was that it must be on a statutory footing. The same must be true as a matter of law, not least the law of the European Convention on Human Rights but constitutional principle, in relation to the commissioning of weapons, surveillance equipment, investigatory technology and new algorithmic technology—much of which is currently under investigation by the new House of Lords Justice and Home Affairs Committee, ably chaired by the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, who is in her place, and comprising many illustrious Members of your Lordships’ House.
If the noble Baroness wants to elucidate further—perhaps not in the Committee—on those issues, I would be very happy to engage with her on them. The only point I was making is that they are elected.
My Lords, I am grateful to all Members of the Committee who spoke on this amendment. I want to be clear: it was a probe, and my ideal scenario would not even be for a regulation-making power in a great big criminal justice Act, it would be an Act of Parliament itself. I say to the Minister—and I mean this genuinely in a constructive spirit—that it was a Conservative Government in 1984 who introduced what is now the Police and Criminal Evidence Act.
What I am really saying is that there is so much of this kit and technology developing apace that we need something at least equivalent to the Police and Criminal Evidence Act to put questions of commissioning and regulation—of who decides what the tests are and what the accountability is in relation to all this development and commissioning of this new technology in the policing space—in one Act of Parliament. Again, it is not a partisan point; I would be saying this whoever the Government were. That was a really important piece of legislation in 1984, and the time has come for something like it. There happens to be another Conservative Government, and I think something like that will come.
What I said to the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson—sitting down—I said a couple of years ago to his predecessor: what is the legal basis of telephone extraction? I was told data protection and consent, or something of that kind. Here we are now, a couple of years later, in response to concerns, and there is going to be under this Bill a clear statutory framework.
I hope the noble Baroness does not mind me intervening, but I again refer her to the Science and Technology Committee, because the Policing Minister talked about gaps in the legislation. In fact, the honourable Member Graham Stringer was pleading for legislation, and I refer her to the comments the Policing Minister made in that regard.
I thank the Minister for that, and I will certainly go back to look at that. When she made her comments, I asked about the statutory framework, the legal basis. A list came back which began with the common law, the Data Protection Act, the Human Rights Act and the Equality Act—all good things—but my suggestion is that, as a matter of good governance, sound regulation and accessibility for the public—this is not about just civil liberties concerns and privacy but public money and accountability—all this regulation should be under one framework. That way there will be consistency across all 46 police forces in relation to where the commissioning should be, which providers are considered to be ethical and which are not, how they are to behave and what the conditions are, and then, once the technology has been developed, how it is to be deployed. I do not think it is asking a lot to suggest that this should all be under a single statutory framework. It would be something that the Minister and her Government could be proud of, and there could be a regulatory framework that could last for many decades, just as, broadly speaking, the Police and Criminal Evidence Act did.
I thank all noble Lords who spoke. To go back to my noble friend Lady Bryan of Partick’s point, where is the statutory underpinning of a National Police Air Service? Where is the Act says that says “there shall be a National Police Air Service”? I am not aware of it. Where is the Act of Parliament that set up a national College of Policing? I am not aware of it. It may exist somewhere, but I have not found it and I do not see it. I am not doing this to score points; I think it would be good governance and good legislation from which many generations and many Governments in future might benefit.
With that, and with my gratitude for taking this seriously, I hope that I have planted a seed for future thinking. The committee chaired by the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, on which I have the privilege to sit, will no doubt develop this conversation with the Minister in due course. I thank everyone for their patience and engagement, and I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
When the noble Lord looks at my speech carefully, he will see I said there is legitimate economic activity for Travellers. I accept that plenty of Travellers engage exclusively in legitimate economic activity. I decided not to tease the noble Lord and ask him who he thought was stealing all the electrical cables from the railway system.
My Lords, the lateness of the hour and eloquence of many of the speeches tonight mean that I can be brief, but I feel compelled to say a few words in this debate. First, to the noble Earl opposite, to cite particular crimes committed by particular people of whichever community is no justification for a measure that targets all members of that community. We could all cite the statistics of people in prison. We know, for example, there is a disproportionate percentage of black and brown people in prison. Would that justify further criminalisation and demonisation of people who look more like me and less like the noble Earl? I think not.
When the noble Baroness looks at my speech in Hansard, she will see that I am arguing, as I will in relation to my Amendment 241, that we need to do something useful with people when they are in prison. The system we have does not address their needs.
I am grateful to the noble Earl for that. Gypsy, Roma and Traveller people are a tiny percentage of our population in the United Kingdom. Undoubtedly, they are one of the most demonised minorities, not just in our nations, but historically and in Europe. We would not have a post-World War II human rights framework but for atrocities perpetrated against minorities, including Gypsy and Roma people.
It is very upsetting to look at Part 4 of the Bill. It is a disgrace. I am sorry to have to say this, but Part 4 is an inherently discriminatory piece of legislation. It is as discriminatory as previous ignominious legislation targeting east African Asians or gay people. If it passes in its present form it will be notorious. I have no doubt at all that it violates Articles 8 and 14 of the convention, at the very least, as other noble Lords have said. I praise the eloquence and perseverance of my noble friend Lady Whitaker in particular, and of many noble Lords and right reverent Prelates.
They know whereof they speak: to persecute people for their nomadic lifestyle—to criminalise the Traveller way of life—is the equivalent, I have no hesitation in saying, of criminalising people for their dress, their food or their prayers. It is a significant attack on their way of life to criminalise them for stopping in places when they have nowhere else to stop. Part 4 is that despicable. I signed one of the amendments; I could have signed any of them. This part, however, should not stand in any primary legislation in a civilised country.
This bit of the Bill is being put forward as part of a very populist and nasty culture war, to use the phrase of the noble Baroness, Lady Jones. It is very dangerous. As the honourable Member for Maidstone, who has not been in this Chamber—perhaps one day she will come—but whose name has been mentioned at many points today, said, be careful about the difference, the fine line, between being popular and being populist. We might well remember that when we consider this part on Report.
My final thought is that in a former role I once had the privilege of chairing a meeting—it was, as I recall, at the Conservative Party conference. The audience was very sceptical about the value of human rights, and the Human Rights Act in particular. It was, potentially, a tricky meeting. I chaired a speaker who was addressing concerns in the audience about prisoners having human rights. Again, that is not a popular group in our society—prisoners and human rights is a bad cocktail. He was saying that prisoners have human rights and that some of them even thought that they had a right to a flushing toilet. What a disgrace that was—the audience was very upset and wanted to scrap the Human Rights Act, as some people still do. This eloquent and learned speaker said that it was very simple to deal with the problem: just fix the loo.
Fix the loo—do not demonise the prisoner, do not scrap the Human Rights Act, just fix the problem that is giving rise to the concern. In this case the fix would be to give people stopping places and the support that they need. The criminal law will deal with burglary and with people using their dogs to terrorise people, and will protect the innocent farmer. I wonder whether the eloquent speaker and passionate defender of the Human Rights Act who spoke at that meeting will remember the occasion, as I always have. He was, of course, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Garnier.
I remember that remark very well, and I adhere to everything that I said then. I hope that the noble Baroness is not setting up an Aunt Sally. The speech that I gave a moment ago did not criticise the proponents of these amendments. It criticised much of the content of Part 4 of the Bill. All I asked was that in seeking to provide a solution for one group of people we did not create a problem for another group.
I am grateful to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Garnier, for that. There is ample criminal law and ample tort law for nuisance. There are ample laws to protect people from burglary, nuisance and so on. This measure, however, is targeted. The euphemism is so thin: “without permission, with vehicles”. I wonder who we are talking about there. The euphemism makes this racial discrimination even more obscene.
My Lords, we strongly support all these amendments. As the noble Baroness, Lady Whitaker, and my noble friend Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville said, the crucial point here is that if legal sites were provided it is unlikely that these provisions would even be in the Bill. Having adequate sites is likely to be cheaper than the cost of taking legal action against those who have no option other than to trespass. As the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of London and the noble Baroness, Lady Lister of Burtersett, said, the Bill’s provisions, whether by accident or design, will very clearly disproportionately impact an already vulnerable minority: the Roma, Gypsy and Traveller communities. What would happen if the Government and local authorities made it a criminal offence for motorists to park their cars illegally and then did not provide enough spaces for motorists to park legally? There would be uproar.
My noble friends Lady Brinton and Lady Bakewell told the Committee from their extensive experience about hostility towards Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities. I have to say to the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, that when he reads back what he said in Hansard it will be open to interpretation that, for every crime he described where he could not say who the perpetrator was, he implied that all those crimes were committed by Travellers, without any evidence that they were responsible for those particular crimes. That is why there is so much hostility towards these communities because speeches such as that can be misinterpreted as, “The noble Earl is saying that those communities are responsible for all these crimes, even the ones where we do not know who committed them.”
Will my noble friend give way? He has just come to a very important part of his remarks. Every community is capable of committing crime, and therefore we have criminal and civil laws that apply to all communities rather than specific measures targeted in a discriminatory fashion.
I thank the noble Baroness, but I think I made it clear in my contribution that I do not believe the Government’s proposals are right or necessary. Do not find a difference with me on those grounds, because it is not what I am suggesting.
If we really want to find a solution to these problems—I think one of the right reverend Prelates made a point about discrimination in education—lots of schools take real pride and make an effort in accommodating Gypsy, Roma and Traveller children. They are the examples of best practice which the Government should encourage. It is not true to say that all Gypsy, Roma and Travellers are illiterate and innumerate—far from it. In fact, one person I met who impressed me was a young woman from a Traveller family who had taken herself through university and become a teacher and an absolute credit to her community. We should beware of sweeping generalisations. They do not help us in these circumstances.
I am aware of the lateness of the hour, but I wanted to make this contribution. I like to think that my activities in support of the Gypsy, Roma and Traveller group will not cause me to be labelled as unfairly prejudiced or discriminatory. Ever since I was capable of doing it, I have fought all my life against any form of discrimination, whether it is anti-Semitism, racism or discrimination against Gypsy, Roma and Traveller groups.
My plea to the Minister when she gets to her feet is to take into account the fact that there are some genuine concerns from a number of us about the nature of the government proposals and whether they will help the situation and are necessary—or whether the existing laws are such. I also do not believe that the nature of the amendments, if I take that of my noble friend Lord Rosser as an example, is a solution to the problem. That is why I suggest that, before we reach Report, the Minister convene a meeting, which might enable us to find a bit more common ground than appears to exist in the Chamber at the moment.