Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Falconer of Thoroton and Lord Judge

Committee: 4th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 12th December 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Judge]

I am going to say much the same as the noble Baroness. I am ever an optimist about this. I think that when the Minister has had time to reflect on the wisdom of some of the amendments that have been proposed that will eradicate some of the less desirable features of this Bill, and make it a much better Act in consequence, we will not need a sunset clause. Oh dear—I have reflected that I may be being optimistic, but I think that I am also being utterly naïve.

I shall not support the amendment at this stage—but if when we come the next stage we have had no improvements in the Bill, then I shall.

[Lord Falconer of Thoroton (Lab)]

I want to underline what was said by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, and the noble Baroness, Lady Kramer. I speak as somebody who has been in the Executive; I have made that point throughout the Committee’s proceedings. I have no doubt that the Bill is necessary, because the nation needs this power. I have no doubt that the noble Minister presenting it is completely—

Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Falconer of Thoroton and Lord Judge

Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 21st November 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Judge]

I shall speak to Amendment 60, which is in this group. It is simply a question of elementary procedural fairness. It is really no more than that and no less than that. It may not be wise to tell an individual before he is designated that he is going to be designated because, obviously, if that were to happen the designation would come too late and the assets would be hidden or dissipated, but procedural fairness is a basic principle of the common law. If you are arrested, you must be informed of the reasons for your arrest. If you are made subject to sanctions of the kind envisaged in this Bill, they affect your livelihood and your ability to support your family and to live an ordinary life so that you are, in the words of my noble and learned friend Lord Hope at Second Reading, in effect a prisoner in your own home. If you are in any way going to be subjected to the coercive powers of the state, you should be told why those coercive powers are being exercised against you and they should be justified. This Bill is bung full of massive coercive powers. In these circumstances, the amendment that my noble friend Lord Pannick and I propose is absolutely self-evident, but without it, or without some concession to this group of amendments, we will end up with having done some insidious damage to an essential constitutional principle, and we should not be doing it. I highlight paragraph 29 of the Constitution Committee’s report, but I do not suppose noble Lords want me to read it.

[Lord Falconer of Thoroton]

What does my noble and learned friend envisage the position to be where the main sort of sanction used is where one is trying to implement sanctions, for example, agreed to in the United Nations? What then does the British Minister do in relation to evidence in relation to why the person is being covered?

[Lord Judge]

Your name goes on the sanctions list before you are told, so as to avoid the dissipation of your assets, but afterwards you are told that you are now designated, these are the consequences, this is why it is happening, this is what you must not do, this is what you must do and—what is more—you had better know that it is X who has given us this information or that we think you are Igor Judge, but actually there is another Igor Judge who lives in, shall we say, Russia and it is him we are after. That way, you can very rapidly get your review looked at and justice done to you.