Public Advocate Bill [HL]

Lord Addington Excerpts

2nd reading
Friday 16th June 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Addington (LD)]

My Lords, as the noble Lord just said, this Bill has been a long time coming. It is coming because of a felt public need that the general public did not get justice, having been confronted by what turned out to be at least some elements of cover-up and, to be perfectly honest, behind-covering by the establishment. The cover-up, as the noble Lord just mentioned, involved the use of stereotypes, saying that the group were all hooligans. That was an easy position to take in the late 1980s when football did not have a good reputation, but it was not the case here. People then refused to admit that they had made mistakes. This appalling record is only just finishing now, three and a half decades later. On those grounds alone, the noble Lord is absolutely justified in taking up Parliament’s time as he has. There can be no real argument about that.

I am sure the Minister will say that these circumstances could not happen now or as easily. That is possible, and there may be something in that—it is a pretty standard government reply. They go through a process of saying, “We’ve done something”, but if it is not absolutely transparent, they have not addressed the biggest part of this. People having to fight to put their rights in law is the starting point of many a campaign. It is very easy to pass a law and say that this should not happen, but everybody who has been involved in any campaign knows that the real work starts in making sure that the law is enforced and that the people in power understand it and implement it properly.

From my experience of Parliament, that is my message about what should be done: you can have a nice statement about everything that should happen, but how do you enforce it? How do you find those people who do not understand how or are unwilling to enforce it, because it is difficult or it makes them look bad? That is what happened here, and it led to obfuscation, people not admitting what had gone wrong and a legacy of distrust.

I will not be as elegant as the noble Lord, Lord Wills, was when he introduced the idea of a tripartite approach, but I hope the Minister will tell us that people will be able to see what is going on and have someone who can guide them through it. If that element is brought in, the biggest potential gain of this Bill will have been achieved—ensuring that people understand what is happening. That is what did not happen. When someone defends themselves with the stereotype of “This is what people like this do”, we can say that, no, it did not happen like that, or indeed it did, to let people know what happened and the justification for that decision.

Making a process transparent, and one that people trust in, is something which all bits of government should at the moment take very seriously. This predates the height of conspiracy culture, but here there is a chance to address it, and to address it when things have gone seriously wrong. If the Government are not prepared to seize this opportunity, they are making a big mistake, and making it much more difficult for anyone who sits on the Treasury Bench to find the time and effort to go back to this. I hope the Government can assure us that they will either expand what they have taken from the aims of this Bill or show us where they will achieve it somewhere else. Saying that the current system is fine really will not cut it.