Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill

Earl of Caithness Excerpts

Lords Hansard - part one & Committee stage
Wednesday 3rd November 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, I am very happy and pleased to support these amendments, which would improve the powers for police and courts to tackle wildlife crime such as illegal hare coursing. Wildlife crime is by its nature difficult to police. When I was on the London Police Authority, I asked the Met police to start logging crimes committed on farms, which they did not do at the time. The problem is that the crimes are often committed far from police stations—especially so since the Conservative Government have closed quite a lot of those police stations. They are also seen as less of a priority than burglary and even traffic offences. There is some exciting new technology that the police can use to overcome these difficulties of geography and resources, but you need the right powers and the power of sentencing.

I have a friend who culls a deer herd for a local farmer. He was out, I think last week, and all of a sudden, two police cars turned up—this was in the middle of nowhere—with their blues and twos going. The police thought that he was a poacher. As he was standing there with a gun, a knife and a dead deer it was a quite difficult argument to make, but they did finally understand and managed to speak to the farmer. My friend takes responsibility for culling deer that have been harmed by poachers and then left to die in pain.

These amendments have practical solutions so that offenders can be perhaps deterred, but certainly punished and prevented from causing further suffering. They are amendments that the Government should accept in full.

[The Earl of Caithness (Con)]

My Lords, I support the amendment moved by the right reverend Prelate. It might surprise your Lordships to know some of the numbers. I am grateful to the Suffolk Constabulary for the figures of incidents of illegal hare coursing. These were the incidents reported—so not necessarily all the incidents—between 1 September 2019 and 31 March 2020. There were 139 incidents reported in 230 days. That means there was more than one incident a day for the police to deal with. The penalties for this illegal behaviour are not sufficient. That is why the right reverend Prelate’s amendments must be agreed.

I want to talk a little about hares, because they have been on the Biodiversity Action Plan list almost since its formation, in 1995. I am hugely grateful, as we all are, for the work done by the Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust, which has been monitoring hares for many years and scientifically working out what their best habitat is. The noble Lord, Lord Carrington, gave us a graphic description of the horrors that farmers have to face, but, if one looks at it from the hare’s point of view, they too would like these amendments.

If the farmer has too many hares on his property—particularly on the eastern side of the country, where the illegal poaching and coursing takes place, because that is where most of the hares are—the farmer will be tempted to reduce the number of hares to discourage poachers. If the laws are not strong enough and the police cannot keep the situation under control, the only sensible option for the farmer is to legally reduce the number of hares to such that it is not attractive for these people to come and drive over their land, smash their gates and cause intimidation. I am sure that, from the hare’s perspective—as I said, they are on the Biodiversity Action Plan, and numbers have been reducing since 2010—they would welcome the strengthening of the law.

I hope that my noble friend will not bat this away by saying that Defra is going to produce something. I think we are all a bit fed up of waiting for Defra to produce things—we need action now. By accepting these amendments, there is nothing here that will cut across what Defra might or might not produce in the fullness of time.

[Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville (LD)]

My Lords, I will speak in favour of Amendments 124 and 128 in the names of the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of St Albans, the noble Lord, Lord Carrington, and the noble Baronesses, Lady McIntosh of Pickering and Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb. I would have certainly added my name had there been room on the list.

The right reverend Prelate has laid out the case for these amendments extremely clearly. Hare coursing is, at present, illegal, but the penalties are not sufficient to deter the really determined criminal fraternity. Big money changes hands during this obnoxious practice, so it is necessary to increase the penalties to assist in preventing unnecessary cruelty to hares and to reimburse the police for the trouble involved in catching and prosecuting the perpetrators. The noble Lord, Lord Carrington, has spoken from personal experience of the effects of intimidation from those participating in hare coursing.

I fully support the measures in Amendment 124, in particular those listed under proposed new Section 4B(6), which gives the list of the disqualification orders, from owning a dog right down to arranging the transportation of dogs. It is entirely appropriate that those subject to disqualification orders should pay for the costs of keeping animals that have been seized and the cost of applying to have their disqualification lifted, whether it is successful or not.

Section 5 of the Hunting Act, which bans hare-coursing events, is rarely used, mainly because of the very tight definition of what constitutes an event. Now is the time to change the way hare coursing is prosecuted to ensure that successful prosecutions can take place. The seizure of both dogs and vehicles is important to ensure that criminals are not able to carry on regardless in another venue.

Hare coursing has devastating effects on farming families. It is classified as poaching, and these amendments apply to all forms of poaching in terms of seizure and confiscation.

The right reverend Prelate has already referred to the NFU’s rural crime survey and I will not repeat those figures. But nearly half of all farming businesses have been targeted by these organised criminal gangs. The right reverend Prelate also set out the threats that farmers have to suffer. It is time to put a stop to this practice and to the high-stakes gambling that profits from this cruel and abhorrent practice.

I welcome the reimbursement of kennelling costs to the police, who have the task of seizing the dogs involved. This is long overdue. As autumn is the current season for hare coursing, which takes no account of dependent, vulnerable young, now is the time for this change in the law to be implemented without delay.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords for their participation in this debate. I have considerable sympathy with the right reverend Prelate’s wish to see greater powers available to the police and the courts in dealing with hare coursing. I have to declare an interest here as I am a member of the BASC, which is a member of the hare coursing coalition.

This vile activity has no place in our countryside. It involves cruelty to the brown hare and, along with the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, I thought that my noble friend Lord Caithness made very important points on biodiversity and populations. It causes real harm to rural communities, with all the associated menacing and criminal practices so eloquently described by the right reverend Prelate, the noble Lord, Lord Carrington, and others. As we have already made clear, including when this issue was debated in the Commons, this Government are determined to take action. Our action plan for animal welfare sets out our commitment to crack down on illegal hare coursing-related activity, providing law enforcement with more tools to address this issue effectively, including through legislation when parliamentary time allows.

Officials in both the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the Home Office are working through the options in detail. My honourable friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at Defra, Rebecca Pow, is responsible for leading on this topic. She has begun detailed discussions of a range of possible measures, including in areas covered in these amendments. These were discussed at a round table she chaired in June. It is important to consider all the options carefully to ensure that the proposals that we bring forward will be effective in achieving the intended aims.

This work will, unfortunately and necessarily, take a little time, but we need to get it right, so I cannot offer the right reverend Prelate any encouragement that the Bill is the right one through which to take the matter forward. However, I assure him that the measures that he put forward in these amendments will be considered most carefully as we develop our proposals. This issue is being taken seriously: I reassure him on that point. Unfortunately, however, I cannot give him the timetable he has asked for. I nevertheless hope that he will feel able to withdraw his amendment.

[The Earl of Caithness (Con)]

My Lords, that was a hugely disappointing reply. What is the difficulty for Defra and the Home Office in accepting this amendment? It does not impinge on the slow, laborious work that they are doing. Quite rightly, they have to take that seriously but, if one does not seize this opportunity to legislate in one area of the bigger picture, then we are losing a huge opportunity. What is the difficulty in accepting this? If it is accepted and it works for perhaps two years, when the next piece of legislation comes forward, it could be amended. The Minister should think of the damage that could be done in that intervening time.

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

I am obviously sorry to have disappointed my noble friend Lord Caithness with that reply, but I can only repeat what I said earlier. I am afraid that these things take time, and the consultations are ongoing. We intend to do something about this problem.

EU Referendum and EU Reform (EUC Report)

Earl of Caithness Excerpts

Wednesday 15th June 2016 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Caithness (Con)]

My Lords, I feel that I am rather in the position of Willie at the “Wet Review” as the person out of step. I am going to talk about the Motion on the Order Paper, but I shall at least be in step with the noble Lord, Lord Boswell.

It is strange to debate reports that your Lordships have produced—I was honoured to serve on the committee that produced the two reports under the chairmanship of the noble Lord, Lord Boswell—when we do not have a reply from the Government. However, that may be just as well, as we would not have had the debate if we had had to wait for the Government’s reply. First of all, I thank all those who helped us on the committee. I pay special tribute to the work of our clerks and our legal adviser, and I thank them for the help that they gave us.

I want to turn to what is called the “new settlement”, which was very much the subject of our first report. As the noble Baroness, Lady Falkner of Margravine, said, this is an important document, although it may well never see the light of day. From the evidence that we got, we came to some very strong conclusions about that new agreement and they are well worth studying.

We have talked in economic terms—I declare my interest as having just served on the EU Financial Affairs Sub-Committee, chaired by the noble Baroness, Lady Falkner—and we have been very concerned about competitiveness, which is addressed in the new agreement. It is one of the major issues that has been taken forward. Indeed, we say in Recommendation 27 that,

“the competitiveness element of the new settlement is a significant achievement”.

It is important to remember that.

Another point that I would like to highlight is the wording of the “new settlement”. It is completely wrong to have called it “A new settlement for the United Kingdom” because much of it relates to how the EU works. As we say in Recommendation 44, it is,

“a misnomer: as our analysis demonstrates, many aspects of the ‘new settlement’ reflect the views of most if not all Member States. If the ‘new settlement’ is in due course implemented, it will have far-reaching effects”,

on how the EU works as a whole. It is sad that the new settlement has played no part in the discussion in the European referendum campaign.

Turning to the campaign, I think that the important thing to remember as part of the background is highlighted in paragraph 5 in our conclusions and recommendations. This refers to the UK being less knowledgeable about the EU than any other member state. I do not think that that position will have improved at the end of this campaign, and that, to me, is a real tragedy.

In paragraph 2 of our conclusions and recommendations, we say:

“The debate leading up to the referendum should be of a quality and breadth proportionate to the importance of the decision. It should be wide-ranging and inclusive, based on accurate information”.

Given that we know so little about the EU, the campaign has been darkness itself.

The noble Lord, Lord Boswell, is right to say that we are here to hold the Government to account, but at this point I want to widen my remarks. I am very angry and saddened by the campaign. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Pearson, that the leave campaign and the remain campaign have done this country no favours at all. To tell a lie often enough and to persuade the public to believe it, and to recklessly disregard history, is a fatal flaw. I am fearful that senior politicians are entering into the no-truth zone. That has huge implications for government in general. It is a serious worry.

There has been no attempt by either side to look at a way forward that could work for Britain and the continent. No effort has been made to project how the future might be or to realise that the eastern part of the EU and the countries adjoining it are in a state of almost anarchy in some cases and heading close to war in others. This is a supremely important time in Europe’s history and both campaigns are looking away and facing inward. That is a real sadness. Perhaps the campaigns have been burnished and become light only on the egos of those involved.

The press have not helped either. It is sad to see but one person in the press box today. Perhaps when we reform this House we might get rid of the press box altogether; it would make no difference to how things are reported.

I turn to the process of leaving. The EU is a highly legal structure. The noble Lord, Lord Jay, made that point, and I want to strengthen it. If Brexit wins the day, we will have to have two agreements: a withdrawal agreement and a new agreement for continuing ongoing business. However, because of the legal structure, if those agreements are what is called “mixed”—that is, they include member state and EU competences—they will have to be agreed by the EU Council, the EU Parliament, 27 member states individually, the UK Parliament and our three devolved Governments, because European law is involved. That is going to be hugely complicated.

One talks about the timescale in which this can be achieved. It is worth remembering, as is pointed out in our report, how little time was given to the renegotiation or “new settlement”. With Britain coming out of the EU, how much less time will the EU give to our problem of trying to negotiate a withdrawal and a new agreement, particularly when there are French and German elections? There is a two-year period—the legal advice is quite clear on this—and because the European Union is a legal structure, we are duty-bound as a country to obey international law. If we do not, we are providing new meaning to “perfidious Albion”.

I have come to the conclusion that referendums are divisive and very distracting. The result of this referendum will not end the problem or the debate on Europe. It is merely a stepping stone in the long history of how Britain and the continent have made an arrangement to live. If we look back over the past 1,000 years, we see that it has been a turbulent arrangement. No doubt that will continue.

European Union Referendum (Date of Referendum etc.) Regulations 2016

Earl of Caithness Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd March 2016 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Caithness (Con)]

My Lords, I recall sitting in this House listening to the debates on the referendum in 1975 and being influenced by their very high quality. We have had some very high-quality speeches today, but I have not been influenced to the same extent yet as I was in 1975. In 1975, there was the danger of isolation of the UK. That was one of the features that came through in the debate.

We are reassured today by the out campaign: “Don’t worry, we are the fifth-largest economy in the world. It doesn’t matter if we get out”. In 1975, we were the sixth-largest economy by GDP so I see no difference. I have also been a Minister in Brussels and been prevented from doing what we wanted to do because of the Treaty of Rome and all the frustrations that came with that. I guess that I am a Eurosceptic by nature. I believe that the architecture of the EU is far from perfect.

However, I have concerns on what the Government have proposed. The biggest concern is between the euro and the non-euro countries. There will be a big clash between the pound and the euro in due course. I cannot make up my mind whether we are better off in Europe trying to help to solve that or better off outside. With regard to businesses, I thought that the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Russell of Liverpool, was the best we have heard today. I was very influenced by that speech. But business has changed—we export services; we export digital equipment and knowledge. That is a very different type of export from what we had in 1975. If we are not within Europe, I fear that those great exports will be the ones that suffer. Let us not forget that the EU will require third-party equivalence for any trade deals that they do with this, as it currently does with any other country. It will take far longer than the out campaign has indicated to get any sort of deal with the countries in the EU.

On financial reforms, I disagree very much with what my noble friend Lord Trenchard said. For four years I have been on the European Sub-Committee on Finance, scrutinising the European laws. All the evidence shows that what has been put forward by the EU would have been put forward by our Treasury in any case. It was not an EU matter but a global matter. Just to help my noble friend Lord Trenchard, I can say: do not believe too much in our civil servants. If he reads the report on Defra’s performance with agricultural payments and he remembers all the gold-plating that our civil servants have done to make us more uncompetitive, then perhaps being in Europe is not quite so bad.

The noble Lord, Lord Soley, mentioned research. That was one of the subjects that I wanted to talk about, too, but there is no need to now that he has mentioned it. I am concerned that we will lose a lot in the research world if we are not part of Europe and we will not have that freedom and the benefit that we get from linking up with European universities and business. After 40 years of being in the membership of a club there are bound to be hidden benefits that will not come to light until a decision is made to leave. I mention the European health insurance scheme as one of the many benefits that people in this country will lose should we come out.

I turn to the other speech that really impressed me, which was that of the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Stirrup. The West is not a fashionable concept at the moment. The world is a much more dangerous place than it was 10 years ago. To my mind, an effective EU is a vital component of a secure EU and a strong West. We have not banged the drum for some of the achievements of the EU in the past 10 years—on the environment, Burma, Somalian pirates and in Iran. Perhaps that is something that we are not good at—beating the drum. If we vote to come out, the biggest party will not be in the houses of those who lead the out campaign; they will be in Moscow and Beijing. Those are countries that believe they would like to be big because if they are big they can bully their neighbours and make their neighbours’ lives much more uncomfortable. We are lucky; we do not have a border with the great bear with its sharp claws, but Europe does. I was hugely influenced on that finance Sub-Committee when we asked the Lithuanian Minister the benefit of joining the euro. His reply was: defence.

Some of the out campaign speeches have done nothing but supported what Scotland tried to achieve last year, which was independence. They said: “Give us our power back. We want to be independent, away from being controlled by overseas”. That is what some of the Scots wanted. The noble Lord, Lord Lee of Trafford, suggested letting the under-30 year-olds have two votes. If the Scottish under-30s had had two votes there would be a separate Scotland now.

I shall end with a quotation that I used in my maiden speech by that great bard Burns:

“O, wad some Pow’r the giftie gie us to see oursels as others see us”.

How would European partners see us? We have preferential terms now; we will have even more preferential terms if what the Government propose is agreed.

If the out campaign succeeds, I am not at all certain that there will be an EU. I would go further than my noble friend Lord Cormack—he said that there would not be a UK. I do not think there will be an EU as we know it now. In that context let me close by reminding your Lordships that the French voted twice against us joining the EU before we did.

House of Lords: Reform

Earl of Caithness Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd June 2011 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Caithness]

My Lords, the past two days of debate have been rather different from our previous debates as we have had a draft White Paper to consider and that has made a substantial difference to the tone of the debate. However, it still saddens me that we have not been discussing what the role of a second Chamber should be before we decide on the composition. We are once again starting with the cart before we actually look at the horse.

Looking at the House now I see a Chamber orientated towards the south-east of the UK. I do not think that is healthy and it has been exacerbated by the change in the expenses system making it much more difficult for those of us who live in the south-west or the north to come and attend at the times we would like to.

When one looks at the size of the House, it is going to take about 450 Peers to fill the committees that we have now. The average attendance for 50 per cent of our sittings is 424 so the size is not far wrong for managing our current workload. However, the current workload has increased as the number of active Peers has increased. Are all the committees we have at the moment relevant? Are they the right ones? On Monday, in a debate on working practices, more committees will be recommended for us.

Indeed, the draft Bill itself requires more work for this House. According to paragraph 125 of the White Paper we will now be able to tackle financial matters again. That is probably a very good thing because if we had been able to do that we would probably have saved some of the ghastly mess we have seen over the past five years as there is more expertise in finance matters in this House than there is in the other place.

The noble Lord, Lord Tyler, says that 300 Members is not workable—of course it is workable. It is only a question of what we do or what we give those people to do. A House of 300 used to be a very big vote in this House. I remember that if we got 300 it was quite something. The House then was working extremely well and extremely efficiently but we were covering fewer areas. It is a question only of what we have to cover.

When one looks at attendance, it is quite interesting—75 per cent of the elected Peers attend 50 per cent or more of the sittings but only 55 per cent of the life Peers attend those same sittings. Are we missing out on the expertise of the 300-odd life Peers who are not attending 50 per cent or more of the sittings? Is their expertise being utilised properly? Surely there is another way we could utilise that expertise and tap it without them having to be Members of your Lordships’ House?

I have always said that the Achilles’ heel of this House has been our working practices. There is no doubt that in the recent past those working practices have been increasingly abused. Some noble Lords will not learn, or even cannot be bothered to learn, our rules and conventions and some deliberately flout them. We have seen that already in this debate on both days. For the first time that I can remember, the Government have been unable to get some of their legislation through in a reasonable time. That was the result of a deliberate decision by some Members of this House. That worries me because once that has been done, it will be done again. I put it to your Lordships that there is a new fault line in this House that cannot be papered over. It is a matter that will have to be addressed as part of the reforms.

In the past two days, it has also been interesting to listen to the damascene-like conversion that some of your Lordships have gone through. I spent 10 years of my life explaining to right honourable and honourable friends in the other place how this House worked, that we were very sorry that yet again the Government had been defeated, and that the Secretary of State would have to change his legislation and make some concessions in order to get a Bill through. Some of those former right honourable and honourable friends are with us today, and it is nice that they now support a totally appointed House. It is, however, a little galling to find that some of them want an exit strategy for life Peers, given that, not so long ago, there was not a life Peer who was prepared to provide an exit strategy for an hereditary who had given up a lot of his life to serve in your Lordships’ House.

What really concerns me is how Parliament functions. The other place, as we know, does not scrutinise legislation as it used to. Increasingly, we are under the heavy hand of an elective dictatorship. My belief is that the other place will not change. The Executive will not allow the other place to control it and, as the Executive have increasingly taken power in the other place, the role of this Chamber has become more important. We have been able to scrutinise legislation, to suggest alterations and make amendments. There is nothing new in that. We did that when most Members of this House were hereditary Peers. It happened to me when I was a Minister. I was for ever making concessions and getting defeated. I do not think that the House is any better now than it was pre-1999.

However, I remain convinced that this House needs major reform because it is only by having an elected House that can challenge the Executive that one will get a better balance in the parliamentary system of this country. The other place will never be allowed to do that. I want a second Chamber to hold the Executive to account and the only way that we will do that is by having an elected House. It is also right and fundamental that the peerage should be separated from the right to sit in Parliament. If someone in the other place has done extremely well, they can be offered either a right to come here, if we have an appointed House, or they can be given a peerage and they do not come here. The two should not go together.

I have a final point on the electoral system proposed in the draft Bill. We had a referendum on the alternative vote system. It would be ludicrous if we did not have a referendum on the STV system. Whatever the outcome of any legislation to alter the constitution of this country, it certainly should be put to the public to decide whether they want it.