Justice and Security Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Henley and Lord Thomas of Gresford

Monday 9th July 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Henley]

I do not think that the noble Lord, dare I say it, listened to what I was saying earlier about this amendment. It may be that we need to look at the drafting. I have given a commitment to the Committee that we will deal with that in due course and look to see whether we have got it right. As I explained—I have to go back into my speech—I think that that is probably the right way to proceed. If the noble Lord is accusing me of taking a Humpty-Dumpty approach, well, Humpty Dumpty was not always that wrong with some of these things; certainty in terms of when one is speaking at the Dispatch Box and defining what words mean. Anyway, if I say it means that, that is what it does mean—that, I think, is what the Humpty-Dumpty approach is.

I do not think that I can add much more to my response to the noble Lord and other noble Lords. I appreciate the intention behind Amendment 25. I appreciate what my noble friend is doing but I hope that the noble Lord will feel able to withdraw his amendment at this stage.

[Lord Thomas of Gresford]

As the noble Lord, Lord Henley, was speaking I wondered whether the word, “proper” is supposed to mean “contrary to convention”. It would be impossible to have a convention across all departments where there are Select Committees so it was conventional in one department to release this information but it might be conventional in another to release more or less. It would be almost impossible to get a standard of disclosure of information across the board which it is proper to disclose. I am very grateful for what the Minister has said on that issue.