Rwanda Asylum Partnership
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town Excerpts(1 year, 9 months ago)
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Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)
I understand the strength of feeling, so of course I will be more than happy to take my noble friend’s suggestion back to the department.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)
My Lords, the Minister said that this was above his pay grade. Not only, as the noble Lord, Lord Purvis, said, does the report that my committee produced yesterday say that it is “unacceptable” that this should be by an MoU rather than a treaty—which means it does not come through this or the other House—but the Home Office declined the invitation to give evidence to us on its reason for avoiding parliamentary scrutiny by using an MoU. There is no excuse for that, and we deserve a reason why the Home Office has back-tracked and used not a treaty, as it should have, but an MoU.
Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)
As I answered to the noble Lord, Lord Purvis, I will absolutely take that back to the Home Office and see what can be done.
UK-Rwanda Asylum Partnership Arrangement
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town Excerpts(2 years, 3 months ago)
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Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town
To ask Her Majesty’s Government why the UK-Rwanda asylum partnership arrangement was concluded by a Memorandum of Understanding and was not therefore subject to parliamentary scrutiny requirements under the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act 2010.
The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Williams of Trafford) (Con)
My Lords, the UK has entered into a memorandum of understanding with Rwanda, which has now been published on GOV.UK, for the provision of an asylum partnership arrangement and to address the shared challenge of illegal migration. The duty to lay before Parliament under the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act 2010 applies only to treaties. However, the safety, security and dignity of and respect for those relocated is assured through the agreement and will be subject to monitoring. We comply fully with our legal and international obligations.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)
The agreement will not be a treaty and it will not be enforceable. Given that the deal would end the Government’s legal obligation to certain refugee claimants and therefore reduce their rights, surely such a significant international agreement should be disclosed, debated and agreed by Parliament. Why have the Government tried to slip this agreement out as a memorandum of understanding, hindering Parliament’s ability to scrutinise it adequately? Does the Minister accept that important MoUs such as this with Rwanda that affect human rights should be routinely disclosed and debated by Parliament under the terms of the Ponsonby rule?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
My Lords, as your Lordships’ House does, there will be ample opportunity to discuss the aspects of this agreement. It complies with our international and other obligations. There will be ongoing monitoring of the agreement, and there is nothing in the United Nations refugee convention that prevents this happening.
Migration
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town Excerpts(2 years, 9 months ago)
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Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I have been fortunate to be able to discuss and debate the question of a cap on numbers with the noble Lord. He is absolutely right to say that our immigration scheme is now a whole-world scheme. It is up to us in time to be able to flex our policies to ensure that the people who live and work here are not being crowded out by others who might, in the words of the public, “take their jobs” and that we have a fair but controlled immigration system.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)
Being Welsh, we sometimes think that we are the original Britons and I welcome everyone else to our nations. I am pleased that the Minister touched on Windrush. One of the recommendations in the lessons learned was that the Home Office should teach its staff more about celebrating Britain’s long role in welcoming people to these shores. Does she therefore accept that, if we were able to get the Migration Museum going, it could be a great resource for the sort of education that could go on for the Home Office’s staff when they have to deal with these issues?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
Nobody is keener than the people who work in the Home Office to learn the lessons of Windrush. I do a number of events with staff from all levels of the Home Office and it is the question that always comes up, because people are very keen to learn the lessons of Windrush. As I said to the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, museums all over the country have a positive and negative slant on migration. The International Slavery Museum in my area shows the real abuse of some of the people who came to this country, willingly or unwillingly.
Brexit: Residence Rights
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town Excerpts(7 years, 5 months ago)
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Baroness Williams of Trafford
As I say to the noble Baroness, the system has been vastly improved. Having acquired permanent residence under the Immigration (European Economic Area) Regulations 2006, an individual must have 12 months free from immigration restrictions before pursuing an application for British citizenship. The inclusion of the date on which an applicant is deemed to have acquired permanent residence helps to inform applicants about the point at which they are eligible to apply for British citizenship. That removes the uncertainty surrounding the process and the cost to the applicant of submitting an application that might be refused on the basis that they have not been free of immigration restrictions for the required time.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)
My Lords, the Question is actually about residency rather than nationality. In order to get residency status, people have to show that they have comprehensive sickness insurance. EU nationals were never told about that when they came here. In fact, most of them are eligible to use the NHS. Therefore, many of them will not qualify under the present rules. When the residency issue is finally agreed, will the Government agree to look at waiving the requirement for comprehensive sickness insurance so that people will be able to stay here under permanent residency?
Baroness Williams of Trafford
The noble Baroness raises a valid point about comprehensive sickness insurance, because not everyone is required to have it. People who are not economically active, obviously, and students have to show that they are self-sufficient in that sense. But I am very happy to clarify that in a letter, which I will make sure is in the Library, because it can be confusing.
Gender Pay Gap
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town Excerpts(7 years, 7 months ago)
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Baroness Williams of Trafford
My Lords, we do not intend to create additional civil penalties at this time but we can review that if levels of compliance are not satisfactory. As the noble Baroness said, non-compliance will constitute an unlawful act and will fall within the Equality and Human Rights Commission’s existing enforcement powers under the Equality Act 2006. I am grateful to the noble Baroness for bringing up this question and I am pleased to say that the trajectory is heading in a very positive direction.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)
My Lords, I started working in 1970, when the Minister was just three years old. Of course, that was also the year of the Equal Pay Act. I would have been devastated had I discovered that, almost half a century later, I would be standing here still with an 18% pay gap. I ask the Minister to do two things. First, will she make sure that government investment is geared towards getting women into the highest-paid professions and industries, because, at the moment, women are mostly in low-paid industry? Secondly, could she possibly tell her Treasury colleagues that, through almost 90% of their tax and benefits changes relating to women, they are only adding insult to injury?
Baroness Williams of Trafford
My Lords, the Government, starting with the previous Prime Minister, are most certainly committed to the very ends that the noble Baroness seeks. Not only are women contributing to tax, but they also bring the huge benefit of increasing GDP in this country.
Brexit: Role of Parliament
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town Excerpts(8 years ago)
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Lord Keen of Elie
With respect, the Government’s position is that there is no legal obligation to consult Parliament on the triggering of Article 50. That is, of course, the subject of challenge in the courts. Indeed, there will be a directions hearing in the Administrative Court tomorrow in respect of one of those claims.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)
My Lords, the referendum campaigns were both all-party. The challenge now falls to all of us to implement the result of that referendum. Will the Minister outline the Government’s plans to engage all parties, and indeed the Cross Benches, in the discussions that now need to take place?
Lord Keen of Elie
The Prime Minister has been very clear that it will take time for the UK Government to agree their position for negotiations in respect of the exit from Europe. They will consult widely, not only with all Westminster governmental institutions but also with the devolved Administrations, including the Scottish Parliament.
Investigatory Powers Bill
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town Excerpts(8 years ago)
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Lord Oates (LD)
My Lords, I will not detain the Committee long. I support the amendments in the names of my noble friends Lord Paddick and Lady Hamwee and I will speak briefly to the amendment in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hollins.
During the coalition, I was involved in the discussions which led to the royal charter and the other commitments made by all the party leaders and the coalition Government. It is important either that the Government commence the relevant parts of the Act or, as the noble Baroness has indicated, that this amendment should proceed to a Division when the Bill comes back on Report. The Secretary of State’s failure to commence the relevant sections of the Act is an utter betrayal of the commitments which were made at the time by all parties, including the Prime Minister. Most importantly, it is an utter betrayal of the many victims of phone hacking and other invasions of privacy who were to be protected by the royal charter and the Act. I hope that the Government will think very carefully about this. Perhaps the Prime Minister, before he leaves office, will stand up and ensure that the commitments which he made personally are implemented.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)
My Lords, I will speak very briefly on Amendment 16, to which I added my name, which has already been dealt with by the noble Lord, Lord Paddick. Should the Government accept the logic of that amendment, they might also want to look at Clause 4(8)(b)(i), which ought also to be amended to include “a private postal service”. Like the noble Lord, Lord Grabiner, I think the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Strasburger, sounds like a carte blanche for allowing private phone hacking. The noble Lord came up with better words than I could when he spoke about thinking that “public interest” and of “interest to the public” were the same. I would be very alarmed at the idea of allowing phone hacking by private bodies, simply because they thought it might be in the public interest.
The more substantial issue in this group is dealt with in Amendments 18 and 246—I refer to them as the Leveson amendments. The Labour Party has an interest in Amendment 18. Our names are not on it but our former leader, my right honourable friend Ed Miliband, was, along with the current Prime Minister, one of the signatories to the deal which has already been described and which led to amendments being withdrawn in this House and in the Commons. Failing to implement Parliament’s decision on this matter is a shameful disregard for the law on the part of the Government. The Act was passed in good faith and the Government should have implemented it, in accordance with the wishes of this House and the other place. Non-commencement is an unacceptable device to undermine legislation which has been passed.
Amendment 18 seeks gently to encourage the Government to bring into effect the law already passed, and we hope they will agree to do that. I will not rehearse the case that has been made so well already. However, it is remarkable that, as we consider a Bill on investigatory powers that sets out clearly and openly what the state and its agencies can do regarding hacking—the limits, the safeguards and the penalties for exceeding the law—private and unaccountable profit-making bodies such as the press continue to get away with things our spooks rightly would not be able to. The Government should not undermine Parliament by failing to commence Section 40 and we hope that, today, they will show their willingness to act now.
Lord Strasburger
Before the noble Baroness sits down, can I point out that I share entirely her concerns and those of her noble friend about journalists confusing the public interest with the interest of the public? If there were any such amendment along the lines that I suggested, it would have to be drafted so narrowly that that confusion could not exist.
Lord Keen of Elie
My Lords, I begin with Amendment 15, which raises the issue of creating a new criminal offence. This was initially discussed in the other place at earlier stages of the Bill’s passage.
In the other place the Government made it clear that each of the powers in the Bill is already subject to one or more civil penalties or criminal offences for misuse. Part 1 has always contained a number of privacy protections that are central to the Bill, and it now makes clear the existing offences and sanctions that apply in respect of the different powers, such as the offences that relate to the unlawful interception or unlawful obtaining of communications data. In addition to the strict safeguards that are explicit in Part 1 of the Bill, there are a number of other additional offences that exist elsewhere in statute but apply equally to any misuse of the powers.
In response to the concerns raised in the other place and with sympathy for the Intelligence and Security Committee’s desire for clarity, the Government listened carefully and tabled amendments that now more explicitly refer to the relevant offences set out in other statutes, such as the Computer Misuse Act 1990, which applies to equipment interference, and the Data Protection Act 1998. These put beyond doubt the penalties that would apply in the event of deliberate wrongdoing by a member of a public authority.
On the basis that there are existing offences that apply to every power in the Bill, the Government are reluctant to introduce a new criminal offence that would lead to confusion, as it would overlap or duplicate those set out elsewhere. Perhaps more simply, it would be unnecessary. The powers in the Bill are varied, each with their own distinct regimes. If we sought, as was suggested by the noble Lord, Lord Janvrin, to create one offence to fit them all, it would either be too broad and catch too much, or by being too narrow actually miss something and result in a less effective sanction. It could also lead to a lack of legal clarity and potentially hamper the effective enforcement of existing offences. The point is that one size does not always fit all.
There is a further concern. The heads of the three intelligence agencies have written to the Home Secretary and to the ISC outlining their very real concerns about the inadvertent operational impact this proposal may have. The officers working within our intelligence agencies are entirely committed to the mission of keeping the country safe. They are professional and ethical in the way in which they conduct their work. We recognise the concerns raised about potential misuse of investigatory powers, but the creation of a new offence may unnecessarily inhibit agency staff and limit their ability to operate with confidence and at pace against the numerous threats we face.
We do not disagree that intelligence officers who are exercising these most sensitive and intrusive powers should consider their actions carefully before using them, but I have seen no evidence that the dedicated men and women of our security and intelligence agencies give such matters anything less than the most careful consideration. I can quite easily see that Parliament’s creating a new offence that appears to be targeted solely and squarely at our intelligence agencies could have a detrimental impact on the confidence, morale and willingness of those persons to carry out the often dangerous yet vital work we ask them to do on our behalf. Moreover, the Government are clear that if anyone in a public authority were to act contrary to their obligations under the Bill, the matter would be taken extremely seriously. The current commissioners already ensure that they investigate and report publicly on the very infrequent cases of errors which involve serious misuse. In appropriate cases disciplinary action may be taken, up to and including dismissal, or civil or criminal liability incurred.
When these points are considered collectively, I hope noble Lords will agree that this puts beyond doubt the severe penalties that would apply in the event of deliberate wrongdoing by a member of a public authority. A new criminal offence is therefore wholly unnecessary and potentially confusing, and would adversely affect the operation of the agencies.
Amendment 16 seeks to extend the criminal offence of unlawful interception to “private” postal services. This is aimed at capturing those services which cater to more specialist clients; for example, companies that provide services to banks or lawyers. The noble Lord, Lord Paddick, referred to DX as an example of such a company. I understand the reason for the amendment and support the principle that the offence should apply to this type of company. However, these companies are already caught by the existing provision. The Bill describes a “public postal service” as one that,
“is offered or provided to the public, or a substantial section of the public”.
This includes companies that specialise in providing services to bespoke sectors, such as the legal profession or banks.
Moving on to Amendment 17, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Strasburger, Clause 3 sets out the offence of unlawful interception. This is a vital safeguard that relates to one of the most sensitive powers provided for in the Bill. It underpins the protections for privacy that are fundamental to the Bill. I am afraid I cannot accept an amendment which would limit or even undermine that safeguard. The amendment would limit the offence by setting out circumstances in which it would not apply; for example, it provides a public interest defence to the offence. It would not be appropriate to allow someone to intercept the communications of another—without lawful authority—because that person takes the subjective view that it would be in the public interest. I note and agree with the observations of the noble Lord, Lord Grabiner, and the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, in this regard. It would not be right to reduce this strong safeguard, which exists to protect individuals.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town
I should have come in on Amendment 16, but before the Minister moves on, the issue of the private postal service was raised by the Minister’s Scottish legal colleagues, who wrote to us. They felt that the definition of “public postal service” did not include DX. I wonder if he will agree to write to me so that the legal position is clarified, since it was good Scottish lawyers who raised the issue.
Lord Keen of Elie
I am obliged to the noble Baroness. It was raised by Scottish colleagues—Scottish colleagues with whom I do not agree—but I am quite happy to undertake to write to her. I should say it was raised by the Scottish Law Society, not the Scottish Bar.
Amendments 18 and 246 were spoken to very clearly by the noble Baronesses, Lady Hollins and Lady O’Neill, and the noble Lords, Lord Lipsey and Lord Oates. While I am quite happy to write on the matter of press regulation and the commencement of Section 40, press regulation is not the purpose of the Bill. I have to make that clear in this context because while I understand the points that are being made, they do not arise directly in the context of these amendments.
Moreover, the relevant amendments are not considered necessary. There is already a criminal offence where unlawful interception takes place on a public or private telecommunications system or a public postal service. There is also a cause of action which applies in a limited set of circumstances, where the criminal offence does not apply. Where there is an allegation that unlawful interception has taken place on behalf of a public authority, a person may seek recourse through the Investigatory Powers Tribunal, which has the power to provide redress, including awarding damages.
Where the conduct relates to an individual who does not belong to a public authority, there are other causes of action which may be applicable. I may have misunderstood the noble Baroness that the tort which currently exists in the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000—allowing an individual to take action against a person who has the right to control the use or operation of a private telecommunications system and who intercepts a communication on that system—has been added to the Bill by way of Clause 8, and that happened after the debate on the Bill in the other place. In these circumstances, we are not prepared to accept the amendments.
Turning to Amendments 20 and 21, Clauses 6(2) and 6(3) are important because they provide that where a public authority, or a telecommunications operator, is acting in accordance with a warrant properly obtained under the Bill, or the provisions of Clauses 42 to 50, they can be sure that they are not breaking any other law or required to obtain additional authorisations. This legal certainty is vital for those engaged in the essential work of keeping us safe.
The first amendment seeks to provide that future legislation could make that conduct unlawful for certain purposes. I understand the principle the noble Lords seek to achieve but I do not believe it is necessary. Nothing in the Bill prevents Parliament amending the legislation at a future date to make any of the activity unlawful or provide that some additional authorisation is required.
The second amendment seeks to amend subsection (3). The purpose of this subsection is to make clear that conduct undertaken in accordance with a warrant or which is authorised by any of Clauses 42 to 50 is to be treated as lawful. This is vital in providing companies with reassurance that by complying with a warrant they will not be acting unlawfully in relation to their regulatory obligations or other legislation. The effect of this amendment would be to provide that the conduct is lawful only for the purposes of the Bill. My concern, were we to accept this amendment, would be that we would remove the legal certainty that the companies and agencies rely on to do their job and to keep us safe. We therefore do not accept the amendment.
Amendment 84 relates to exceptions from the duty not to make unauthorised disclosures about warrants. It is absolutely right that the Secretary of State should be accountable to Parliament, even for the most sensitive decisions concerning the most sensitive powers. But when it comes to such matters, which necessarily must remain secret, it is absolutely right that Parliament provides a mechanism for the Secretary of State to be held to account, while at the same time doing nothing to jeopardise national security. That is the very reason for the existence of the Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament.
To put beyond doubt that the Secretary of State is, and will continue to be, accountable to Parliament through the ISC for decisions relating to warrants, the Government amended Clause 54 and Clause 123 to make clear that the Secretary of State may disclose matters relating to warrants to the ISC. This will allow the ISC to carry out its statutory functions in holding the Government to account, while maintaining our security. It is right for the ISC to carry out this function and it would not be appropriate for disclosure to be made to Parliament as a whole. To do so would breach the long-standing principle of successive Governments to neither confirm nor deny matters relating to intelligence and security and could risk jeopardising our national security. Accordingly, I invite the noble Lords not to press their amendments.
Investigatory Powers Bill
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town Excerpts(8 years ago)
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Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)
My Lords, we have had a rich stream of expertise today, including from those who have served on the pre-legislative scrutiny committee as well as on the ISC and the Joint Committee on Human Rights. We have heard from colleagues who have operated the powers over security or crime, from colleagues who are expert in the legal world and from others who have reported on these matters, as well as from a couple of spooks. We have been reminded of the challenges we face as a society: to keep us safe and to protect our privacy while maintaining a way of life that we cherish and enjoy.
There have been the cases of Fusilier Lee Rigby; the Jewish grocery and school in France; British tourists just a year ago on Sousse beach; museums in Tunis and Belgium; music cafes and sports arenas in Paris; transport in London; the French police; Charlie Hebdo journalists in Paris; gay clubbers in Orlando; deadly bombers in Brussels airport and the metro; children, sadly even babies, abused; missing children here and abroad; guns and drugs smuggled on to our shores or bought on the internet; people trafficked; and organised crime with international connections.
Women are often harassed and stalked. Lily Allen described the massive and incredibly disturbing impact of that, much of it via social media, while our own much-loved and missed Jo Cox had been harassed by a stream of messages over three months.
So we cover just about everybody. Jews and Christians, Muslims and non-believers, straight and gay, men and women, MPs, journalists, police and clubbers; at work, at play, on holiday, shopping, travelling, at school—all have been targeted by those who mean harm. Unfortunately there are people and organisations who would hurt not only us but even people who are far more vulnerable than us.
So we have an obligation to halt that harm and stop it happening. The problem is not new. As my old supervisor, the noble Lord, Lord Hennessy, reminded us, it goes back to John Stuart Mill’s day—that desire to protect our privacy and ensure that the state does not take on intrusion which breaks the precious contract between people and government.
It is for this reason that, in examining the Bill to see whether the balance of security and privacy has been achieved, we welcome the new and overarching Clause 2, which says that in exercising its powers, the relevant authority must consider the issue of privacy. This requirement is even more necessary given how society now functions. Indeed, I sometimes feel that I am watched all the time—and by private companies, as my noble friend Lord Rooker reminded us. My phone records where I am, to whom I spoke, which websites I visited, and even how many steps I take each day. Between that, my credit card and Oyster card, CCTV and my entry fobs, everything I do and every step I take is known to someone.
It was rather different when I was growing up. We used to chat in pubs, at the school gate, at work, in the kitchen, at church, in college, in clubs, at the hairdresser—or I suppose the barber, for some noble Lords. We sent postcards, even Valentine’s cards, and telegrams, we kept our appointments in diaries or in a Filofax, and we gossiped on the phone. Today we use social media—web chats, texts, apps—for all that, as if it is a private sphere, and we talk about our loves, fears, dreams, frustrations, job applications and misdeeds, our thoughts and opinions about our friends and neighbours, and even about our politics. Even wider than what we do with our friends, we trust our doctors, lawyers, priests and indeed journalists to keep our secrets safe and secure. So while we rightly demand that our security is safeguarded, we also want and expect what we think of as that private world to be safeguarded.
As we have heard today, in the Commons there was, perhaps unusually, thorough debate, as well as the willingness of the Government to listen and respond. We have all been helped by the expert input from my honourable friend Keir Starmer, the then shadow Home Office Minister, which helped make considerable progress in improving the Bill, such that Labour could support it at Third Reading.
The Government’s establishment of the Anderson review of bulk powers, the moves on a higher threshold for medical record access, the double lock for major modification of warrants, the exclusion of normal trade union activity from interference, and the requirement for judicial commissioners to give weight to the overarching privacy clause have all made our task so much easier. We will of course look carefully at what David Anderson, assisted by his expert colleagues, finds regarding bulk powers, and will respond as necessary. There are other issues we will want to finesse and probe before we finally sign the Bill off—in particular the threshold for ICR access and a determination of what is “serious”.
We also need to safeguard further the ability of clients to rely on their lawyers’ discretion when they talk to them, and we need to refine the protection of journalists’ sources. We must give people the ability to speak without fear of identification. It would not be in the public interest for such risk to silence those we want to speak out. We look forward to the outcome of the Government’s discussion with the Bar Council, the Law Society and CILEx on the former issue and to their talks with the NUJ and the Society of Editors on the latter, as well as on the definition of who is a journalist. Maybe it is somebody reporting for outlets covered in any way, shape or form by some sort of regulatory system. Of course, that raises the question of whether the Government will ever fully implement Leveson.
However, much has been achieved. We welcome the consolidation of the existing powers in a transparent form, as well as the creation of the IPC and the double lock, and the involvement of the IPC or judicial commissioners not just in decisions but in monitoring and review.
We welcome the recognition of the role played by parliamentarians, journalists and lawyers in giving voice or protection to others, with the confidence for those citizens that the privacy of those exchanges will, with only very rare exceptions, be safeguarded. We will want to test the current wording on these sensitive professions, as the Bill perhaps has not yet achieved the right balance in protecting the privacy of those who need it most.
We welcome the “no prosecution” undertaking for whistleblowers who have used the channels provided. We welcome that urgent warrants will be speedily reviewed and, if necessary, cancelled by a judicial commissioner.
We welcome the involvement of the PM in access to parliamentary material, and the avowal and updating of the Wilson doctrine. Also welcome is the introduction of civil liability for unlawful interceptions—although we also heard views today about whether there is a sufficiently serious offence for anyone who wilfully misuses the powers in the Bill. We may want to return to that.
We need an answer from the Government to the question that my noble friend Lady Smith put to the Leader of the House today, to which she got no response, and which was repeated by my noble friend Lord Rosser at the start of this debate. Given that we will leave the EU, are changes now needed to the Bill to retain the close working relationship we have with those allies, with whom we will now be in a slightly different relationship?
As we have heard, there is rarely a right or wrong balance in the situation that we face. We want security and we want our privacy, civil liberties, respect for human rights and confidentiality. We have still to assure ourselves that this Bill has quite the right answer, although great progress has been made. That is what we will seek to achieve as we scrutinise the fine print in Committee. We look forward to working across the House on that aim.
Road Traffic Act 1988 (Alcohol Limits) (Amendment) Bill [HL]
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town Excerpts(8 years, 5 months ago)
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Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)
My Lords, I congratulate and thank my noble friend Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe for bringing forward the Bill. He has been a marvellous campaigner on this subject for a long time. It is a shame that the Government have not taken action, especially given what my noble friend said about their knowledge of the extra risks of people driving with a BAC between 50 and 80 milligrams.
We increasingly stand alone internationally by retaining the 80 milligram rather than adopting the 50 milligram figure. It is now just Northern Ireland, England, Wales and Malta in Europe that stick at 80 milligrams. In fact, four EU countries have a limit of zero. Indeed, proud Welsh girl that I am, I have to take my hat off to the Scots, who have done the deed—and the sky did not fall in. In fact, as the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, said, there has been a 12% drop in offences, while eight in 10 Scots believe that drinking any alcohol before driving is unacceptable.
This is always a difficult subject for me to discuss, as, a day short of my 10th birthday, I lost my mother because of a drunk driver. Who knows, she might have been saved and lived had she been wearing a seat belt. In those days, of course, they were not even fitted, much less compulsory. However, as a result of endless campaigning, and finally an Act of Parliament—in both of which my noble friend Lord Robertson of Port Ellen played a key role—the law was changed with regard to seat belts. Now, we would not think of driving without wearing one. That is what I want to see happening with regard to drinking and driving—I want it to be unthinkable. A step towards that is to reduce the limit because we know that that will reduce the number of accidents. I think we have done with campaigning—just as we did in relation to seat belts before we brought in the relevant law. It is time to make the change.
I pay tribute to those who have campaigned on this issue, not just my noble friend but organisations such as the Campaign Against Drinking and Driving—CADD—set up to help the families of those bereaved through drink-driving, the Livia Trust and others who campaign for safety on the roads. We owe it to them, to those who have lost loved ones, but also to those who have been injured through someone driving after drinking, such as the Paralympian, Simon Richardson, to make this change.
For myself, I could, being a moderate person, live with this measure being introduced gradually, perhaps initially for drivers under the age of 21—as we know, they are overrepresented among the fatalities—or, perhaps drivers in their first two years after passing their test, or while holding a provisional licence; but start we must. Fifteen per cent of deaths in accidents involve at least one driver over the limit. Those are tragic but avoidable figures. In 2013 there were 250 deaths and 8,000 injuries, 1,000 of which are very serious, due to somebody driving after drinking. Would we accept so many deaths due to any other cause and do nothing about it?
Clearly, as has been said, lowering the limit is not all that is needed. We also need enforcement and publicity for real change to be made. However, a reduction to 50 milligrams would make a difference. As my noble friend said, that reduction is supported by more than three-quarters of the population. We know that at 80 milligrams, drivers are six times as likely to die in an accident as those who have not drunk at all. This is partly because, even if they do not cause the incident, they are less likely to be able to avoid a dangerous incident after they have been drinking. We are well aware that there is a direct relationship between the amount that is drunk and the ability to function behind the wheel. Even between 20 and 50 milligrams, drivers increase their chance of an accident threefold. Up to 80 milligrams, the risk increases sixfold, and up to 100 milligrams, they are 11 times as likely to have an accident. Therefore, reducing the legal limit would lower the number of accidents and improve road safety for all of us.
We, of course, are not the first to call for this, nor are we the only people who support this change. My noble friend Lord Brooke reminded us of the North report of 2010, which estimated that a reduction to 50 milligrams would save 100 lives a year. That is two a week. Those are real lives: they matter. The noble Earl, Lord Attlee, said that of the people who died, only one was between the 50 and 80 milligrams level.
Earl Attlee
My Lords, only 1% were between 50 and 80 milligrams, compared with the others.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town
It is even more than that in terms of people and human lives, and when you think of the families affected. Surely that makes the case for us to make this change. As has been said, the Local Government Association has said that about £300 million a year could be saved in police, hospital and ambulance costs. That is without taking account of the costs to families. However, it is not just a question of victims. When I started to campaign on this issue for obvious reasons a long time ago, I was worried about the organisations representing drivers. In fact, the AA, the RAC, the Chief Fire Officers Association, the Police Federation and the Road Haulage Association all support this change. Let us listen today to the victims and to my noble friend Lord Brooke and, for once, not take the advice of the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, and give this Bill not just a Second Reading but our wholehearted support.
Electoral Registration and Administration Bill
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town Excerpts(11 years, 6 months ago)
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Lord Norton of Louth
My Lords, I will make a couple of comments on the amendment. I am a bit wary of it. I rather shared the view of the Electoral Commission in their evidence to us:
“The Commission is clear, however, that any change should only be made if there is firm evidence that it would be of significant benefit to electors. At present, the evidence on weekend voting provides an insufficient basis on which to reach a definitive conclusion”.
Therefore we would need a far stronger evidence base before proceeding. Moving to this for the next election would be rather an experiment, on a bit too grand a scale. We need much better evidence before proceeding.
I raise a more general point that I have variously developed before. I am always concerned that discussing such proposals can amount to a form of displacement activity by politicians. Voter dissatisfaction and apathy have little to do with the process of voting. If people are motivated to vote, they will vote. To motivate people to vote we need to address policies and political behaviour. Politicians cannot say, “It is not us, it is the system”. I fear it is us. We need to be addressing that and doing so in a sustained manner. With amendments of this sort, however well intentioned—clearly they are, and there is a case for discussing it—my worry is that it actually risks masking a much more important debate that we need to have. We need to open it up on a much wider scale. There is the obvious point that if we make a change of the sort proposed by my noble friend this is perhaps not the appropriate time or Bill to do it. We have already messed around this afternoon with the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill. I do not think that we need to be messing about now with the Fixed-term Parliaments Act.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town
My Lords, this is always an interesting one; it feels so natural that it must be easier to vote over two days than over one, and at a weekend. On the face of it, the proposal seems very attractive. However, following on from the noble Lord, Lord Norton, in all the doorstep work I have done—and I have done a fair amount—it has never been a complaint that I have heard. Although it sounds quite attractive, I have never heard people saying, “Why don’t we vote at the weekend?”. However, perhaps we should look to France. When we were discussing the amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Lexden, I think noble Lords were saying that we should follow France, which votes on a Sunday. Much more importantly, of course, they voted socialist on a Sunday, so we should definitely follow what France does.
It sounds attractive but we are perhaps in a closer place to the Government in that we await some evidence about whether this merely sounds attractive and easy, or whether it would do what I think all of us want and increase public engagement and accessibility for voters, which we are going to come on to in an important amendment shortly. What we need is evidence and some more thought on this, and we will then happily look at it. If evidence is brought to us that this would increase both turnout and engagement, we would respond quite positively. However, at the moment, we are slightly lacking that evidence.
Lord Gardiner of Kimble
My Lords, first, I thank my noble friend for moving this amendment, because it has given us an opportunity to consider the points on weekend voting. This amendment would amend the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011, to change the current position, whereby the date of the parliamentary general election is on a fixed day, to a position whereby the Prime Minister would specify by order that polling for the next general election could take place on any day, or on two consecutive days, between 2 May and 10 May 2015. The provision would then apply for subsequent general elections every five years over the course of one day, or two consecutive days, and within the first 10 days of May. I understand that this is to allow the Government to consider the case for weekend voting and to implement it at the next UK parliamentary general election in 2015 and at subsequent general elections. This is clearly an important issue.
As noble Lords will be aware, there are arguments both for and against moving polling day from the traditional Thursday to another day or days, perhaps at the weekend. Similarly, there are arguments for and against holding elections over more than one day. We know that moving to weekend voting would raise particular issues and concerns for certain faith groups. However, it is not obvious that moving polling day from the traditional Thursday to a Saturday or Sunday, or both, would make it easier for electors to vote.
The most recent assessment of opinion on this issue was a consultation exercise undertaken in 2008 by the previous Government, which made the findings public. The overall response was against a move to weekend voting, with some 53% of respondents taking that view. Additionally, where weekend voting has been tested in a small number of electoral voting pilots, the total take-up was generally around 2% to 3% of the overall total number of votes cast, and there is no evidence to suggest that it encouraged voters to vote who would not have otherwise done so.
For these reasons, I do not believe that this is the appropriate legislative vehicle to make such a change, or even to open up the possibility for the Prime Minister to make the change later without, as the amendment is drafted, the consent of either House. Moreover, alongside concerns about practicability, moving to weekend voting would also raise resource and cost issues. Importantly, an impact assessment undertaken by the Ministry of Justice in February 2010 under the previous Government concluded that moving from Thursday to weekend voting would increase costs significantly. Staff, polling station and counting costs would all rise with weekend voting, as would the costs of storing and securing ballot papers over two days at the weekend. The impact assessment estimated that, in total, costs would increase by around £58 million per general election. This clearly is not the primary factor, but it is one that we should consider in discussing this amendment.
Given that there is no clear evidence that the electorate would favour such a move to weekend voting, the Government have no current plans to move polling day for either the general or other elections to the weekend. However, they will keep under review ways in which the democratic process can be enhanced. For these reasons, I hope that my noble friend will agree to withdraw his amendment.
“( ) In section 13(4), at end insert “provided that the registration officer shall not make any such changes if an election specified in section 13B(4) is scheduled to take place within 30 days of publication of the revised version of the register.””
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town
My Lords. This amendment stand in the name of my noble and learned friend Lord Falconer of Thoroton and myself. It is quite a small amendment about trying to counter electoral fraud. Luckily, we do not have an enormous history of electoral fraud here, but if anyone did want to do it, the easy way is to add a small number of electors to the register fraudulently over several months. The problem is that the shorter the time between them doing it and when the election takes place, the harder it would be for that attempted fraud to be identified. That is the problem that this amendment tries to meet.
The police commissioner elections took place quickly after the new register, when there would not have been time to do any checks. Probably, that is not good practice, although we understand the reasons. The other issue is that we need the register in good time for an election so those of us sad people who go round door-knocking have time to identify everyone who is on it and give them the opportunity to meet us and hear what we have to say. I know that the Government acknowledge that there is possibly something in this that could be looked at. The Government are not convinced that it would reduce fraud, but would be happy to look at these implications with the electoral administrators. We welcome that.
We have a concern about this potential fraud and would therefore ask if the Government agree that we need to take steps to prevent the sort of events that we saw in the 2007 Slough postal vote frauds occurring again. Perhaps the Government could also explain why they think this amendment risks producing new risks, whereas it is obviously aimed at reducing the potential for fraud. I beg to move.
Lord Gardiner of Kimble
My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness for bringing forward this amendment. As I understand it, the amendment seeks to provide that those electors who remain on the register following the canvass would retain their existing electoral number if an election were to take place within 30 days of the publication of the register.
The amendment raises a number of practical considerations and could make the process for compiling the register, and the register itself, more complex. It may also result in additional costs for electoral registration officers if their IT systems have to be adjusted to meet these new requirements.
It is not certain that the amendment would necessarily address the concerns that were quite rightly raised by the noble Baroness, especially as implementing the proposed change could take up the time of EROs that could more usefully be spent on other matters arising from their registration duties. Of course, individual electoral registration is being introduced to tackle electoral fraud and to improve the integrity of our electoral system, in particular the electoral register.
The proposed change could lead to confusion in the data being included on the register; for example, it is not clear what would happen when electors are removed from the register following an annual canvass. If it is intended that the numbers for such electors are not to be used on the new register, this would result in gaps in the numbering of electors on the register. It is not clear how electors who are added to the register would be numbered; it may mean that a different numbering system would be used for new electors. This could mean that persons living at the same address are subject to different numbering systems and their names could appear on different parts of the register, which I understand could be an issue for the logistics of producing and distributing poll cards. When a revised register is published, parties will in any event need to update the data they hold to reflect changes to the register; that is, persons removed and added to the register.
On the face of it, this amendment could bring added complexity and cost to the electoral registration process without bringing the obvious benefit that I know the noble Baroness is focused on, which is the reduction of electoral fraud. For those reasons, I ask the noble Baroness to withdraw her amendment.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town
I thank the Minister for that. Certainly, we do not want to add complexity. As someone who has gone round knocking on doors, the last thing we want is different numbers within the same households, for reasons that I think we all understand.
I am grateful to the Minister as I think I heard him say that he understands what we are trying to avoid. If the Government or the Electoral Commission can perhaps work with electoral officers and look at that issue of having time to check on fraud, we will leave it to their good offices to do that. On that basis, I withdraw the amendment.
Lord Lexden
My Lords, I shall make a few comments on the amendment, to which I added my name. As the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, the noble Baroness, Lady Jay, and other noble Lords have made clear, the need for the change has been questioned on the grounds that at the previous election, problems arose in only a small number of polling stations. As they have said, that surely cannot be a strong argument against the amendment. Everyone who wishes to vote and arrives at a polling station before 10 pm must be accommodated. That is the principle from which we must not deviate. The comparatively few cases of difficulty that occurred in the 2010 election were widely publicised and aroused considerable concern, as they were broadcast on television throughout the country. That does no good for the image and reputation of our electoral system. A repetition simply must be avoided.
It has also been said that all voters should be able to make their way to the polling station well before 10 pm. Who can tell what personal difficulty or domestic problem might arise in the case of particular voters, causing them to arrive at a polling station at the last minute? The country needs the assurance that the official in charge of each polling station will devise clear, practical and sensible arrangements well understood by his or her colleagues running the station to enable all those who arrive before 10 pm to cast their votes. That is why the amendment is to be commended.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town
My Lords, it is very hard to imagine that the Government will say anything but yes to the amendment—no, I do not think that I am quite getting that message back.
I am sorry about that. I hope that between now and Report, the Government will think about the amendment seriously. The numbers here may not be as full as they were earlier, but it is clear that it is pretty widely supported. We on all these Benches fully support it. As we have heard, so does the Electoral Commission. The noble Lord, Lord Tyler, suggested that it has been left up to individual assistant returning officers. It is not fair to put it on to their shoulders, particularly if there is a TV camera looking over them at that point, whether they decide to be sensible or not; whether the queue is inside or outside; or whether, if there is more than one ballot paper because we have a multiple election, as we often do, and people have one in their hand but not the other, they are to deny them that vote. It is not fair for the decision to be on the person in charge of that polling station.
I also do not think that it is fair that if you turn up at 10 o’clock in a nice, quiet area you can wander in—as sometimes one does in the Lobby here when there are not many on our side—but if you as an elector happen to turn up in a busy area, you will be discriminated against because other people will also have turned up late.
I had not heard of the government advice to turn up early. That is the reverse of what we had when I was young: it was called drinking-up time. We used to be allowed 10 minutes that way. That suggests that the Government want us all to be there at 10 minutes to the hour. We do risk assessments elsewhere, where we look at likelihood and impact. I think that the Government are right that the likelihood of this is low. Returning officers have realised that there are cameras and that they should not do that again. The likelihood may be low, but the impact will be high both on those going to the polling station—it is serious that they cannot vote—and on those watching on television people who have turned out to vote but who are not allowed to. We do not want that. I hope that the Government will think again about this.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Home Office (Lord Taylor of Holbeach)
My Lords, I thought that I had had enough excitement for today, but this is an interesting debate. At first sight, everyone was positively affronted by the fact that people intending to vote found themselves in a queue and were unable to do so. At the previous election it was a disgrace. If I remember the press reports right, one of the queues was well over 100 people long. It was clearly a huge error on the part of the people responsible for organising the polling stations. Contrary to what has been implied, these were not people turning up at the last minute. The queues had formed during the day and existed for quite a lot of the evening. Those of us involved in elections will know that the peak time for voting tends to be between 5 pm and about 8 pm. If a queue has formed then—it can happen; I think that most of us will have seen that—one would hope it is not big enough to disadvantage voters who come along later. However, the size of the queues at the previous election—which were reported during the day—clearly impaired the ability of people to vote, and that is not a good thing.
I am going to disappoint noble Lords, particularly those on the Constitution Committee, because I know that my honourable friend Chloe Smith talked to them last Wednesday. The answers she gave them are very similar to the answers I am going to give. I hope that the House will forgive me. It may be that those answers are right. We have to think through a change of this nature and think of the consequences. The Constitution Committee, as the noble Lords, Lord Pannick and Lord Lexden, and the noble Baroness, Lady Jay, said, also supported this aim and obviously has given this matter a great deal of thought. It takes the view that this would give greater clarity. We need to write the discretion of the polling station clerk into law so that they can do that. I appreciate the sentiment behind the amendment, but we are not entirely sure that it would help to clarify the present arrangements.
While it might seem initially like a sensible response to the queueing at 9.40 pm, there is a real danger of creating unintended consequences and reducing the clarity and certainty of the law. As it stands, the law is very clear—a ballot paper cannot be issued after 10 pm. Elections are quite precise affairs. Votes are a matter of quite fine delineation and that is particularly true in local government elections. Although queues in local government elections are relatively rare, they were referred to in the Scottish local government elections. Returning officers, polling station clerks and voters know where they stand because it is enshrined in law. The present certainty around the time of close of poll and what close of poll actually means—no issuing of the ballot paper—also facilitates other aspects, for example, the requirement that exit polls cannot be published until the polls have closed. If the polls have not closed somewhere because there is a queue this makes it much more difficult for those responsible for public exit polls to be sure that anything they say may not influence a potential voter. It may sound pedantic but we are talking about something which requires precision. What would be the impact of this on the timing of results if a significant number of electors queued up? I do not think it is beyond the wit of certain people to have a bit of fun with this and to form a queue. It can be done and it might occur. There is also the risk that some people might use this as an opportunity to make a public statement about elections, particularly in areas where tensions exist.
It has been remarked that controlling and delineating a queue is quite difficult. Where is a queue? What is a queue? Most of us think that we know one when we see one, but not many of us would like to take responsibility for actually harnessing a queue, particularly without the power of a police officer. After all, the police officer is not acting under the instructions of the returning officer. A police officer would not wish to interfere with what constituted a queue, while those administering the election might be better off issuing ballot papers rather than trying to organise a queue. I am suggesting that there are factors of people control and definition that are important.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town
The Minister is spending quite a lot of time on the word “queues”. It would be helpful, not least for those who tabled the amendment, if he could say whether the Government would also have a problem if the amendment said,
“A voter who is in the polling station … at the time specified … shall be entitled to apply for a ballot paper”,
or if it is simply the matter of the queues that they have a problem with.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town
My Lords, this amendment would delete subsection (3) which states that:
“An order under subsection (1) may appoint different dates for different purposes (including different days for different parts of the United Kingdom)”;
that is, to commence the Act, as it will become. This gives the Minister considerable power and we would not willingly see that handed over because it will enable a pick-and-mix approach towards when different parts of the Bill come in.
My particular questions concern the provision, I think for the first time, to commence different parts of the Bill in different parts of the United Kingdom. It is slightly hard to understand what the Government have in mind in writing that into the Bill. This is, after all, an all-UK provision, even if votes take place in different parts of the country. This Bill is about a new system of electoral registration and who will be on the register in the future. We would like to know why the Government feel they need a power to bring in just by ministerial order different parts of the Bill in different parts of the United Kingdom. I beg to move.
Lord Gardiner of Kimble
My Lords, this amendment seeks to remove a technical part of the Bill—namely, Clause 25(3)—which would mean that the order commencing the provisions in the Bill would not be able to state different dates for different purposes. The subsection in question is a standard provision in legislation and the effect of this amendment would be to prevent the commencement of different parts of the Bill at the most appropriate times.
The Bill is set up to make changes over a two-year transition period. It is drafted with that in mind, and some provisions are specifically drafted to commence at different times. It is presumably not the Opposition’s intention that the planned two-year transition would become a big bang switchover with all the preparation work having to be done at the same time that IER was live.
The amendment would also mean that the much-needed improvements to the administration of elections contained in Part 2 could not be commenced until the provisions under Part 1 relating to IER were ready to be commenced. This would result in either delay in the electoral administration provisions being commenced or the Government being required to commence provisions of the Bill well before they intend to use the powers enabled by them.
The amendment would undermine the entire transition to IER, for example, by not allowing the Government to bring forward an order delaying this year’s canvass until IER was in force, thus defeating the purpose of doing so. It would also mean that electoral administration provisions under the Bill could be commenced only all at once and only alongside the IER provisions. For these reasons, I ask the noble Baroness to withdraw her amendment.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town
I think the noble Lord did not answer my main question. What is the intention behind allowing it for different parts of the United Kingdom? We are less worried about the staging of the Bill. Why bring it in at different times for different parts of the United Kingdom?
Lord Gardiner of Kimble
My Lords, I am not aware in detail of the issue raised by the noble Baroness. I had better write to her about that because there is a point that needs clarification—unless a further message reaches me, which would be extremely timely so that we can tidy this up. My message tells me that this legislation has been designed to be as flexible as possible, and that is why the legislation is drafted such as it is. Perhaps I could consider the matter and come back to the noble Baroness.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town
That offer is helpful. The bit that worried us was about it being done in different parts of the country at a different time. With the kind offer to write on that detail, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.