World AIDS Day

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Thursday 1st December 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con)]

My right honourable friend the Chancellor has long been a champion of UK Aid. I very much hope that, as a consequence, in his current capacity he will be able to do more than that. I hope that he will be able to return us as quickly as possible, as soon as the fiscal situation allows, to 0.7%. With 0.5%, we are still one of the most generous countries in the world, but it also inhibits some of the areas where we showed real leadership in the years up to that decrease. I have every confidence that the Chancellor will wish to do everything he can in his current post to bolster our position of global leadership through our deployment of aid, and part of that of course is having rigorous targets and ensuring that we have value for money.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, is not one of the major issues around HIV the stigma attached to people who are HIV positive? It is not widely understood but, with effective treatment, viral load can be undetectable, and those people cannot transmit the virus to other people. What are the Government doing both in the UK and globally to reduce the stigma associated with HIV?

[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con)]

The noble Lord makes an important point, and he too has been a vocal champion both in the domestic context and beyond. The UK itself as a country is a champion of human rights around the world, and we are committed to the principle of non-discrimination on any grounds, including on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity—the issues that are often conflated with the issue that we are discussing today. The noble Lord is absolutely right to point to the stigma associated with HIV/AIDS and his point around the facts of the issue will have been recorded for posterity—the facts of the efficacy of current treatment and the removal of danger that that results in.

Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Monday 21st March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stedman-Scott (Con)]

I hope my track record speaks for itself, in that I am very happy to meet noble Lords on a cross-party basis. I am pleased that the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, is pleased with the EHRC investment. I take the point about legal fees, and of course I will discuss that with the Minister—without any promises. On the definition of Islamophobia, which the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, and my noble friend Lady Warsi raised, I am afraid that we cannot accept the APPG definition of Islamophobia because we do not want to adopt a definition that would conflict with the Equality Act.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, I have two questions. How will the new community consultation arrangements differ from the Section 106 police-community consultative groups established following the Scarman inquiry? And how will the Government counter the inevitable accusations that the new geographic stop and search data will give the police the excuse they need to target innocent black people?

[Baroness Stedman-Scott (Con)]

I will need to go back to my colleagues in the Home Office to see how the consultation will differ, and I will provide an answer to the noble Lord. On the issue of stop and search and the targeting of and focusing on young black people, that is not what we want and that is not what we are striving to do. But the question the noble Lord asked is relevant, and again I will feed that into the system, get an answer and write to him.

British Citizens Abroad

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Tuesday 24th March 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon]

My Lords, once again, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Collins, for his support. He and I are talking about the issues impacting British nationals globally, and I am very grateful for his support in this matter. He asked a number of pertinent questions on the concerns that exist. I, too, listened to the debate on the Statement in the other place, and, rightly, genuine concerns have been raised. I am sure that I speak for many in your Lordships’ House today, as well as others.

Noble Lords have been contacting me on an almost hourly basis with genuine concerns that have been raised with them. I assure the House that my colleagues and I are dealing directly with, and taking up, those issues. Only this morning, I was dealing with a consular case that had arisen. We are seeking to speak directly to the Members of Parliament concerned to ensure that we address those issues head on. As the noble Lord will be aware, my right honourable friend the Foreign Secretary will be leading a virtual call with G7 Foreign Ministers tomorrow and this is the item on the agenda. We are not alone in this matter—all countries across the world are impacted. However, the noble Lord is right to raise the need for clarity and information. We are seeking to improve that, as improvements can always be made.

He talked about doubling capacity and asked whether demand was being met. The fact that we are having to double capacity means that current demand is not being met. To be candid, there will be challenges ahead. I am the Minister for south Asia, where, thankfully, the number of cases thus far has been minimal. However, we are challenged by the fact that there are thousands and thousands of British nationals abroad, and we need to react to that positively and proactively. A major part of the Foreign Office effort is that, barring certain priorities that need to be sustained, Ministers and officials are now fully focused on this crisis.

The noble Lord’s point on data collection is well made. We are continuing to collect data on nationals abroad. He made a very constructive suggestion about NHS workers abroad, and I will certainly take that back to see how we can best factor it in.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, I understand what the Minister says about Singapore, but he is aware that Qantas, for example, is rerouting via Darwin rather than Singapore? What discussions are the Government having with the Australian Government about perhaps rerouting British Airways flights via that route? Is he aware of the BBC story about a couple who were booked on a flight from Egypt? They were told that their flight was cancelled, only to find that it then operated as an emergency flight, with their seats having been sold to somebody else and leaving them stranded. What are the Government doing to make sure that airlines do not profit from this disaster?

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon]

My Lords, the noble Lord has, rightly, raised a concern. We are actively engaging directly with various airline operators. British operators and our colleagues at the Department for Transport are meeting regularly—not just not on a daily basis but often several times a day—to establish connectivity. He raised the issue of hubs and the rerouting of certain flights, and specifically mentioned Qantas. Singapore acts as a key hub for those coming from Australasia. I have a vested interest in that, as my in-laws are in Australia, so it is a route that I know well. The other key hub that we have is in the Middle East. Concerns have been expressed about the suspension of flights announced by both Etihad and Emirates, which has implications for travellers going through the Dubai hub. I know that my right honourable friend the Foreign Secretary is prioritising calls in this respect.

The noble Lord raised a specific case relating to Egypt. I did not know about that, but perhaps he can forward the details to me. However, I stress that, if anyone is aware of a constituent, friend or family member in that situation, the first port of call has to be the high commission or the embassy.

Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill [HL]

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 29th November 2017 Lords Chamber

Debate on whether Clause 40 should stand part of the Bill.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, in asking that Clause 40 should not stand part of the Bill, we seek the clarification that I asked for at Second Reading, and failed to receive from the Minister, about Clause 40 and the power to make provision relating to routes to challenging decisions with immigration implications. Noble Lords will know that the Bill gives powers to Ministers to impose sanctions. Among them are immigration sanctions or the power to designate persons as “excluded persons” for the purposes of Section 8B of the Immigration Act 1971. In essence, part of the sanctions package could be either to remove designated persons from the UK or to prevent them entering the UK. The Bill provides a mechanism for those affected to ask for the decision to impose sanctions to be reviewed, initially by a Minister and subsequently by the courts—the Court of Session in Scotland and the High Court in the rest of the UK—which could include the decision to designate an individual an excluded person. This would, in effect, be an appeal against the decision to impose the sanction.

An excluded person could, alternatively or in addition, claim that they have a right to asylum in the UK or that their human rights would be infringed if they were returned to their country of origin or refused entry to the UK. This would, in effect, be an appeal against the consequences of the imposition of the sanction, rather than against the decision to impose the sanction itself. It is important that these two potential routes to challenge being designated an excluded person—either the decision to designate or the consequences of being designated—are dealt with separately and appropriately. My understanding is that that is what Clause 40 allows the Government to do, by regulation.

However, Clause 40 is quite complex and, at the same time, non-specific about what the regulations and their effect might be. The Explanatory Notes to the Bill appear to suggest, in paragraphs 115 and 116, that claims of asylum and human rights will continue to be dealt with by the Home Secretary as the Minister with the knowledge, experience and expertise to decide these matters, not by the Minister imposing the sanctions, and that any appeal against the Home Secretary’s decision would be to the immigration and asylum chamber of the First-tier Tribunal, a specialist tribunal with expertise in deciding such claims, not the High Court or Court of Session, where an appeal against the imposition of the sanction would be heard.

In a letter dated 16 November, the Minister stated that it was the Government’s,

“intention to provide, at Committee stage, an illustrative draft Statutory Instrument in relation to the powers under clause 40, so that Peers can fully scrutinise how decisions that have immigration implications will be taken and the routes of challenge”.

We are in Committee and have come to Clause 40 in the Bill, and no illustrative draft statutory instrument has been made available. Can the Minister tell the Committee how noble Lords are expected to accept Clause 40 in the absence of what he promised in his letter?

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon]

My Lords, perhaps I might intervene in this debate and save the Committee some time. First, they say that sorry seems to be the hardest word but it is not for me. I apologise to the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, since after Second Reading, as he said, I wrote to him and said that the Government intended to bring forward a draft instrument and would put on record during Committee the Government’s intended policy in regard to this clause. I regret to say that we have not fulfilled the first part of that intention—I will come to it in a moment—but I hope that, through what I say, I can fulfil the second part of it now.

Let me assure the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, and the Committee more generally that much work has been, and continues to be, done between officials in various departments on refining this important policy area. As the noble Lord acknowledged, the issue is complex and involves not only the specialist tribunal but how this relates to other aspects of the Bill. This has meant that, despite best efforts by officials, the draft statutory instrument was not ready to be published. It was my view and that of the Government that, rather than publish a statutory instrument that is not yet fully ready, Parliament would be better assisted by seeing a more mature version of that instrument. To that end, my officials and others across Whitehall will continue this work apace. We will endeavour to publish a version of the statutory instrument ahead of Report. I would be happy to meet the noble Lord in the interim to discuss this specific issue. I would also like to put on record for the Committee the intention behind this clause and address some of the points that he made.

Clause 40 concerns how appeals against the immigration consequences of UK autonomous sanctions are handled. I would like to give the Committee some background as to the current arrangements before I go on to speak about the clause. Under the current arrangements, UN or EU travel bans are, in the vast majority of cases, imposed on individuals who are outside the UK and have no connection to the UK. The Immigration Act 1971 already makes provision for persons subject to UN travel bans. Clause 40 allows us to ensure that the persons subject to UK autonomous travel bans can benefit from a similar provision.

In the unlikely event that a UK autonomous travel ban were to be imposed on a person in the UK, this would, as a matter of domestic law, have consequences for their immigration status in the UK—a point I know concerned the noble Lord, Lord Paddick. Whereas a person who is outside the UK will be refused entry, those who are in the UK will lose the right to remain here and may be subject to removal. A person affected in this way might argue that any removal from the UK would interfere with their rights under the European Convention on Human Rights, or be contrary to our obligations under the refugee convention. As a result, they may wish to make a human rights or humanitarian protection claim to prevent their removal. These immigration claims are usually decided by the Home Secretary, and a very developed machinery has grown up around the decision-making process to ensure that it is fair and effective and, importantly, complies with our international obligations. Such decisions, once made, can also give rise to a right of appeal before the immigration and asylum chamber of the First-tier Tribunal, a specialist tribunal with expertise in deciding such claims.

I turn to the Bill. Such immigration claims may also be made against the immigration consequences of a UK autonomous travel ban imposed under the Bill. Again, immigration claims are most likely to arise where an individual in the UK would lose their right to remain here. Noble Lords might ask why we need Clause 40, given that this situation can already arise in the context of a UN or EU travel ban. I wish to explain the point here. The Bill establishes a new administrative reassessment process for designations and a court review process in the High Court or, in Scotland, the Court of Session. No such equivalent administrative and court mechanisms are currently applied in domestic law for UN or EU travel bans. The mechanisms in place are different, so we will need to adapt the existing decision-making and appellate structures that I described earlier in order to accommodate the Bill. That is why we need Clause 40.

I turn back to the practicalities. Cases of this kind are likely to be limited in number, but it is vital that we get this right—a point made by the noble Lord himself. The Government consider it important to ensure that such claims are handled appropriately. We want to ensure that domestic sanctions do not unjustifiably interfere with fundamental rights or run contrary to our obligations under the refugee convention. It is also important that the effectiveness of our domestic sanctions regime is not compromised because our domestic legislation no longer enables us to manage effectively such immigration claims as may be made. The Government have therefore considered how these immigration claims should be treated in the context of the new administrative reassessment and court review processes.

Our conclusion is that, as a starting point, we should seek to maintain the status quo. The Home Secretary and the Immigration and Asylum Tribunal should remain the appropriate decision-makers, as they are now. Both the Home Office and the tribunal are vastly experienced in this area, having dealt with 38,681 human rights and asylum claims and appeals in 2016 alone. However, some changes will be necessary in order to ensure that domestic legislation enables us to manage situations where, for example, there would otherwise be the possibility of both the High Court and the tribunal considering the same issues, or the High Court being required to determine a protection claim that the Home Office had not had the opportunity to consider.

To illustrate the point, whereas the tribunal would be best placed to determine an appeal against an immigration decision, determining the lawfulness of a decision to freeze an individual’s assets is a decision that would be better suited to the High Court. The clause provides the powers necessary to make these changes, which will ensure that we continue to comply with our international obligations and that the effectiveness of our domestic sanctions regime is not compromised. To provide appropriate scrutiny, regulations made under this power will use the draft affirmative procedure.

I give this very detailed explanation along with, once again, an apology to the noble Lord, Lord Paddick. I believe that at Second Reading when he raised this issue I had momentarily left the Chamber or I was near the Box to clarify something, so I did not fully hear his contribution and read it only later in Hansard. As I said, I put on record that we would look to return to this in Committee, which clearly we have not been able to do. I am much minded that the instrument put forward is one that we have looked at extensively and reflects the detail of what I have just submitted to your Lordships’ House. I therefore hope that with that somewhat detailed explanation, which I briefly mentioned to the respective Front Benches out of courtesy to your Lordships’ House, the noble Lord will be minded to withdraw his amendment, with the assurance that I look forward to working with him specifically on that SI before Report.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon]

I think that I am being corrected by my rather forceful Whip on my left. I am sure that this matter will be clarified through the usual channels.

[Lord Paddick]

My Lords, I very much welcome the support and contribution of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer of Thoroton. I am very grateful to the Minister for explaining that asylum claims, and any claim that somebody’s human rights will be infringed, will be dealt with by the most appropriate Minister—the Home Secretary—and through the immigration appeal tribunal route, and not by the provisions in the Bill to appeal against the imposition of the sanction itself. I am grateful for that reassurance; it is the one that I was seeking.

I am grateful, too, for the Minister’s apology for missing some deadlines, if I may put it that way. Obviously, I am content to withdraw my opposition to Clause 40 standing part of the Bill.

Clause 40 agreed.

Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill [HL]

Lord Paddick Excerpts

2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 1st November 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Williams of Trafford, said in her answer to a question earlier this week that Foreign Office issues are not her area of expertise. They are not mine either, but this Bill overlaps to some extent with my responsibilities on these Benches for home affairs. I have one question for the Minister on Clause 40 and the power to make provision relating to immigration appeals. If noble Lords will allow me, if we can deal with this matter today by means of a comment from the Minister in his summing-up, it will obviate the need for amendments later in the Bill’s passage.

As noble Lords will know, the Bill gives powers to Ministers to impose sanctions, and among those sanctions are immigration sanctions or the power to designate persons to be excluded persons for the purposes of Section 8B of the Immigration Act 1971. In essence, part of the sanctions package could be either to remove designated persons from the UK or to prevent their entering the UK. In addition, the Bill provides mechanisms for those affected to ask for the decision to impose sanctions to be reviewed, initially by a Minister and subsequently by the courts—as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope of Craighead, has said, the Court of Session in Scotland and the High Court in the rest of the UK—including a decision to designate them as an excluded person. This would in effect be an appeal against the decision to impose the sanction.

An excluded person could also claim that they have a right to claim asylum in the UK, or that their human rights would be infringed if they were returned to their country of origin or refused entry to the UK. These would be appeals against the consequences of the imposition of the sanction, rather than appeals against the decision to impose the sanction itself. It is clearly important that these two potential routes to challenge either the decision to designate or the consequences of being designated are kept separate. My understanding is that that is what Clause 40 would allow the Government to do by regulation.

Clause 40 is quite complex and I wonder whether the Minister can reassure the House when he sums up that, as the Explanatory Notes appear to suggest at paragraphs 115 and 116, claims of asylum and human rights will continue to be dealt with by the Home Secretary—the Minister with the knowledge, experience and expertise to decide these matters—not the Minister imposing the sanctions, and that any appeal against the Home Secretary’s decision would be to the Immigration and Asylum Chamber of the First-tier Tribunal, a specialist tribunal with expertise in deciding such claims, not the High Court or Court of Session, where an appeal against the imposition of the sanction would be heard. I appreciate that that is what is contained in the Explanatory Notes, but that does not have legal effect, whereas clarification from the Minister at the Dispatch Box would.

Outcome of the European Union Referendum

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Wednesday 6th July 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, I have been asked to contribute to this debate with regard to the law and order impact of the decision by the British people to leave the European Union. I make it clear from the outset that I want to be positive and helpful in pointing out the areas where I believe the Government need to focus. I do not believe in Project Fear, and my record shows that I never did—but, for the record, I supported and voted for the UK remaining in the European Union.

My understanding with regard to the exchange of highly sensitive intelligence relevant to national security and the combating of terrorism is that it tends to be shared on a bilateral basis with some of our European partners and not others. I see no serious impact on those bilateral arrangements as a result of us leaving the EU. But the same cannot be said with any degree of certainty about the sharing of other intelligence in relation to serious and cross-border crime, the operation of the European arrest warrant and the operation of Europol. For example, until recently, the UK Government decided not to participate in the Prüm Decisions. This EU agreement allows member countries to rapidly match unlimited numbers of fingerprints and DNA profiles found at crime scenes with databases held by other member countries and to check foreign vehicle registration plates. Although we have agreed to participate now, there is at least a two-year lead time. The recent decision to join in this initiative is now in jeopardy unless the Government can make alternative arrangements. There are existing routes to carry out these checks through Interpol, but these take weeks and sometimes months instead of seconds—or, at the most, 24 hours—using Prüm. Will the Minister ask the relevant team how we might secure the advantages of participating in Prüm despite leaving the EU?

No doubt the Government might say, as the noble Lord, Lord Howard, said this afternoon, that it would be in the interests of both the UK and EU member states for such co-operation to continue. Conversely, EU member states may argue that we should not be able to enjoy all the benefits of EU membership without being a member.

[Lord Howard of Lympne]

Does the noble Lord not agree that actually our European neighbours—still partners but about to be erstwhile partners in the European Union—benefit enormously more from those arrangements than we do? They make many more requests to this country for co-operation then we make to them, so they would be the losers if these constructive co-operative arrangements were not to continue.

[Lord Paddick]

Clearly, both the UK and the European Union would be the poorer without having these arrangements, but at the present time we are not members of the Prüm agreement. Therefore, we do not benefit at all from this rapid exchange of data, whereas other members of the European Union do. I cannot personally foresee how we are then going to become a member of the group that shares in those tremendous benefits when we are outside the European Union unless the Government can negotiate a deal.

Europol has been important in tackling cross-border crime. Close European co-operation to deal with such serious crimes as child sexual exploitation is essential. Europol, headed at the moment by a UK citizen, has successfully facilitated joint operations involving police forces from many EU countries. These joint operations may no longer be possible unless alternative arrangements are put in place. The European arrest warrant has been valuable in bringing people swiftly to justice, including terrorists who have fled the UK. Will the Government explain how they will prevent southern Spain from becoming a haven for fleeing fugitives, as it was before the European arrest warrant came into force?

This House has on many recent occasions debated the issues around racism and xenophobia, and the status of EU nationals currently resident in the UK and of British residents currently resident in the EU. Many noble Lords have concluded that the EU referendum has given people the confidence to give effect to feelings harboured for some time. What action will the Government take to tackle the root causes of such feelings and to restore a climate where racists feel unable to act?

Another difficult issue that needs to be addressed is the one mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Hain: that of the border between Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic. There appear to be conflicting principles. If the principle of free movement of people within the EU, including the Irish Republic, is no longer to apply to the UK, but the free travel area enjoyed by UK citizens and citizens of the Irish Republic, but not other EU citizens, is to remain, I urge the Government to address now the question of how the border is to be controlled in such circumstances.

Parliament passed legislation to delegate to the British people its power to decide whether the UK should be a member of the European Union. The British people, by a majority democratic vote, decided that we should leave the European Union. I believe that we cannot now decide that we want to take that power back just because we do not like the result.

LGBTI Citizens Worldwide

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Thursday 17th September 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, I, too, thank my noble friend Lord Scriven for securing this very important debate. In considering the treatment of LGBTI citizens worldwide, it is important that we remember our own history. We have been where other countries are now. Therefore, it is possible for other countries to make the same progress that we have. As my noble friend Lady Barker said, it was not long ago that we had legislation similar to that which we are complaining about in other countries, such as Section 28.

I pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, not just for his lifelong work on HIV and AIDS, but for his work against prejudice and discrimination of all kinds.

I also thank the noble Lord, Lord Black of Brentwood, for introducing the very important issue of the link between the prevalence of HIV and criminalisation. I hope noble Lords will not mind if I appear somewhat self-indulgent in talking about some of my own experiences, but I think it is important for people to read about others’ experiences to help with the normalisation process.

Nineteen fifty-eight was a notable year. It was the year the Life Peerages Act was passed, and most of us would not be here if it was not for that. It was also the year that my twin brother was born. I am just testing to make sure that noble Lords are awake. It was also the year that the Homosexual Law Reform Society was formed to campaign for the implementation of the Wolfenden report.

While we have to go back to 1835 to find the last people in the UK to be executed for sodomy, when I was born same-sex activity between men was still a criminal offence. In England and Wales, homosexual activity between two men over the age of 21, provided no one else was present, was decriminalised in 1967, so by the time I had my first sexual encounter with another human being in 1979—another male police officer—I was not committing a criminal offence. However, that is only half the story. As the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, said, the problem in Russia is not just that anti-gay legislation was passed by unanimous vote of the Federal Assembly, but that 75% of Russian public opinion is also anti-gay.

My police officer colleague and I were petrified of being found out. He would talk to me only when I was in my room late at night, when there was nobody else around. He would not even look at me if we encountered each other when other police officers were present. Fearing the adverse reaction of my colleagues and the end of any further career progression if I was found out, it took me a while to officially acknowledge to the police service that I was gay—20 years. Because of social pressure, not least from my family, and the honestly-held belief that a relationship with a man was impossible because of the social conditions that prevailed at the time, and wanting a relationship more than anything else, I dated women. I was engaged three times and married Mary in 1983. It was only when work problems became so great that I could not deal with them and with “living a lie”, as some would have it, that I cracked under the pressure and told my wife. Mary said, “If you had told me you were leaving me for another woman I would never have forgiven you, but I realise that you need something I cannot give you”, and she has been amazingly supportive ever since.

The pressure of having to use gender-neutral terms at work to disguise your sexuality when talking about what you and your partner did at the weekend, and being in constant fear of being seen in the wrong part of town or in the wrong bar or club, is draining and inhibiting. In many countries that is what LGBTI people have to put up with today. It is a constant fear of being yourself. Even when I eventually decided to be publicly open about my sexuality, it was not easy. Having debated with a Mail on Sunday columnist at the Oxford Union, and having got on very well with him—at least, so I thought—he subsequently called me in my office at Brixton Police Station, where I was the police commander. “As you know”, he explained, “we keep files on people and I just wanted to check a few things. The first question I have for you is: is it true that you are homosexual?”. A few months later, Mary called. A journalist had tried to doorstep her to ask questions about me. It was only a matter of time before they tracked down one of my disgruntled male ex-partners. A front page and eight inside pages of the Mail on Sunday were filled with a mixture of lies and intimate details of the five years we had lived together—everything from where I bought my suits, what moisturiser I used and what my HIV status was. Eighteen months later, my claim that the newspaper had breached my privacy was settled out of court, although the newspaper claimed it settled because it had libelled me.

The points I make with these anecdotes are that, despite those difficulties, I have had a very easy ride compared with LGBTI citizens in many other countries, and that changing the law, although important, is only half the battle—arguably, the easier half. The other reason is that it is important for people living overseas to know what is happening here and the progress that we have made.

In January 2009, I did something that I never believed I would be able to do. The real significance of what was happening did not really strike me until the judge in the courthouse in Oslo, Norway, said, “We are gathered here to witness the marriage of Brian and Petter”. They conducted the ceremony in English; the Norwegians are very obliging. I married a man but when we got on the plane to fly back to London the next day and landed in England, we were not, in the eyes of the law, married here. Our marriage was recognised as only a civil partnership until last year. We did not feel that our relationship was equal until last year. As the noble Lord, Lord Smith of Finsbury, mentioned, my husband and I are still not legally married in Northern Ireland and same-sex couples cannot marry there, which is unacceptable.

Using the very helpful House of Lords Library Note for this debate, it is easy for my husband and me to avoid going on holiday to the 75 UN member states where same-sex acts are not legal, not least the six that still implement the death penalty for those acts, but LGBTI people who live in those countries invariably cannot avoid being there. Not only can they not give expression to their true feelings but, as the noble Lord, Lord Collins of Highbury, said, the law encourages those who wish to violently attack those who differ from them. People are not being allowed to be themselves and their rights under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Articles 2, 5, 7, 9, 12 and 18, are being breached.

Life for me has been difficult because I am gay and, even now in the centre of London, one of the most diverse and liberal cities in the world, I am still being subjected to homophobic abuse. I cannot go into further details because the case is sub judice. This is nothing compared to what LGBTI people in many other countries have to contend with, as my noble friend Lord Scriven so graphically described in recalling what happened at Istanbul Pride. Parts of this country are at least leading by example on equality for LGBTI people. However, what are the Government doing to raise these breaches of human rights against LGBTI people in other parts of the world?

I respectfully suggest that, rather than seeking to restrain the human rights of those in the UK through a UK Bill of Rights and repeatedly refusing to implement judgments of the European Court of Human Rights, this Government should divert their resources into championing the human rights of LGBTI people across the world.