Public Order Bill
Debate between Lord Patten of Barnes and Lord CormackTuesday 7th February 2023
(1 year, 9 months ago)
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Lord Cormack (Con)
My Lords, I am glad that my noble friend has just said that, because it was the point I was going to make. I will make one brief intervention. I was always brought up on the proposition that it is better that someone who is guilty goes free than that someone who is innocent is punished. That ought to be our guiding principle, particularly when we are dealing with such sensitive issues and such an important Bill.
When the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, spoke very briefly, and very powerfully, she began with a story from China. We do not want to be bracketed with that. We talk a lot in this House about the importance of freedom of speech, and we mean it—passionately. However, freedom of speech cannot exist properly unless there is a free press. It may often say things that we deplore or get the balance wrong, but it must have that freedom. A free society depends upon a free Parliament and free speech, and it depends upon a free press and free broadcasting. We are going in the wrong direction with this issue if we do not accept the amendment that has been signed by a very distinguished Law Lord: the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope of Craighead. I would take his advice on this as much as I would take anyone’s. It would be better if the Government did not oppose this amendment.
Lord Patten of Barnes (Con)
I would like to follow what my noble friend just said, or at least the beginning of his remarks following the speech by the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott. If the Chinese Communist Party, through its quisling administration in Hong Kong, was introducing legislation like this, we would denounce it. The Foreign Office would denounce it—it would be in its six-monthly report about attacks on freedom of speech and attacks on freedom in Hong Kong—and we would all cheer. It is astonishing that we are proposing in this country the sort of thing which we would denounce if the Chinese Communist Party were doing it in Hong Kong.