“Honour-related” Violence

Lord Lester of Herne Hill Excerpts

Tuesday 14th February 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, before I came here, I wrote down honour-based violence and put inverted commas around “honour”. The noble Lord has made the point exactly for me. It is a strange use of the expression “honour”, but it is the one we have at the moment. Possibly, as the noble Lord says, we ought to find a better expression.

[Lord Lester of Herne Hill]

My Lords, my interest in this comes from originating the Forced Marriage (Civil Protection) Act. We have plenty of criminal law already, and we should be careful before we add any more crimes to the statute book since that could lead to people not coming forward to report these evil and barbaric practices, but does the Minister agree that there might be a case for strengthening it where there are breaches of the forced marriage protection orders?

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, I am aware of my noble friend’s interests in these matters. He will also be aware of my right honourable friend the Prime Minister’s desire to make the breach of a forced marriage protection order a criminal offence. I also understand what my noble friend says about the dangers of adding crimes to the statute book. We should bear that in mind. He will be aware that a consultation is in progress on this subject, which finishes, I think, some time in March. At the end of that period, we will consider the appropriate options.