European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Debate between Anna Soubry and Philip Davies

Ping Pong: House of Commons
Wednesday 20th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Philip Davies]

My right hon. and learned Friend did not give way, and I am not going to give way either because time is limited. Parliament cannot vote to reverse the decision of the referendum. People outside this House need to know very clearly today that—

[Anna Soubry (Broxtowe) (Con)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Philip Davies]

I am not going to give way, as there is no time. I want people outside this House to know that those who are voting for this “meaningful vote” today mean that if the Government decide that no deal is better than a bad deal—[Interruption.] Does it not show how out of touch this place is that “no deal is better than a bad deal” is even a contentious statement? It is a statement of the blindingly obvious, but amazingly some people find contentious.

Redcar Coke Ovens

Debate between Anna Soubry and Philip Davies

Tuesday 13th October 2015 Commons Chamber

[Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)]

My hon. Friend the Member for Warrington South (David Mowat) is right about the irony of the Labour party complaining about steel plants closing when it imposed the Climate Change Act 2008 on the UK, which unilaterally put huge costs on energy that other countries did not face. Will the Minister confirm that the Government have learned the lesson and will not unilaterally impose huge energy costs and carbon emission targets on British businesses? If the Government do not make that commitment, many other manufacturing jobs will follow. We are merely exporting jobs to other countries around the world.

[Anna Soubry]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. However, even if we had the sort of energy prices that I would like, it would not solve the problem for our steel making industry, which is that the price of steel has almost halved because of over-production and under-consumption.

Veterans’ Pensions

Debate between Anna Soubry and Philip Davies

Monday 16th March 2015 Westminster Hall

[Katy Clark]

On a point of order, Mr Davies. This debate is on veterans’ pensions, but the Minister does not seem willing to address the issues that have been put forward. Could you make a ruling?

[Philip Davies (in the Chair)]

As far as I am concerned, the Minister is within the scope of the debate. I confess that I have given her a bit of latitude to talk about accommodation and things like that, but given that we have had plenty of time on our hands I did not think that was too much. As far as I am concerned, the Minister’s comments have addressed the subject of the debate. Whether they have been to the taste of the hon. Member for North Ayrshire and Arran is a different issue altogether. If the Minister goes out of order, the hon. Lady can be assured that I will bring her back to order.

[Anna Soubry]

I must say, Mr Davies, whether or not I was out of order, I thought that identifying certain matters might assist colleagues. In fact, I was saying that there is always more to be done. If I am not allowed to talk about mental health in relation to all those who have served, then so be it.

I conclude by saying that the Government take this matter seriously. Military charities do an outstanding job and we have made funds available. I am not convinced that a separate scheme should be set up. I think it would be fraught with complexities. Goodness knows on what basis people could make their applications. The bureaucracy that would be needed and that would be involved would be extensive. It would cost an enormous amount of money and, at the end of the day, the money has to come from somewhere. Although we have been successful in ensuring that the LIBOR funding is going where it should go, not even that funding would be able to satisfy a fund that is thought at the moment to be somewhere in the region of billions of pounds.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Anna Soubry and Philip Davies

Monday 20th October 2014 Commons Chamber

[Anna Soubry]

I do not need to review it urgently because the review is under way. Indeed, I have had a meeting with my officials in the past few weeks, so I am very much alive to the issues. The situation is a bit more complicated than the hon. Lady has explained it, because further complications are involved. However, I hope to be in a position to be able to explain the conclusions that we hope to come to very swiftly.

[Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)]

16. What assessment he has made of the criteria used by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission to determine the level of maintenance of war graves; and if he will make a statement.

[The Minister of State, Ministry of Defence (Anna Soubry)]

Graves are maintained by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission predominantly for Commonwealth armed forces personnel who lost their lives in the first and second world wars. Since January 1948, all service personnel who die in military service and receive what we call a service-funded funeral are entitled to have their grave marked with a military pattern memorial regardless of the circumstances of the individual’s death. If their next of kin chooses to mark their grave with a military pattern headstone, my Department will offer to maintain that headstone and grave at public expense. Families are free to choose to mark the grave with a private memorial. In those cases, the MOD does not maintain the grave.

[Philip Davies]

I am very grateful to the Minister for that helpful answer. A constituent came to see me recently to tell me that her son, who served in the armed forces and was killed in a terrorist attack, could not have his grave tended by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission because he was not killed in active service. Could the Minister confirm whether that is right or not, whether there should be such a distinction and whether anything can be done to help my constituent?

[Anna Soubry]

I am very grateful to my hon. Friend for that question and I know that he wrote to the Ministry of Defence only last week; in fact, I saw the letter this morning. I am more than happy to meet him to discuss the matter, because I think it may not be quite as simple as it appears at first blush. I am sure we can find a way of resolving it and am happy to meet both him and, of course, his constituent.

Tobacco Packaging

Debate between Anna Soubry and Philip Davies

Friday 12th July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Anna Soubry]

Well, I could say that the hon. Lady’s party, when it was in government, had 13 years to introduce such legislation. Indeed, I am more than happy to say that. If it was so simple to introduce standardised packaging, why did Labour not do it? It is not as simple as they now try to make out. Most importantly, I believe, Mr Speaker—and I do speak as a lawyer—you always want good legislation that is evidence-based. That is why I am more than content to support a delay, while we wait to see the evidence as it emerges from Australia.

[Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)]

I congratulate the Government on this decision. The Minister will recall that the last time I raised this subject in the House, she told me that I would see the light, and I am delighted that she and the Government are the ones who have seen the light on this issue. She cherry-picked some numbers of people in favour of and against standardised packaging from the consultation. Could she tell us the figures from the full 688,000 responses? How many of those were in favour and how many against?

[Anna Soubry]

Forgive me; I do not have that information at my fingertips. I am more than happy to supply it to my hon. Friend by way of a letter, or any other mechanism.

The position I have set out is what we now need, and if there is a criticism that I would make, it is that we went to consultation first. All good legislation needs a good, healthy debate, followed by, perhaps, wider consultation. We now need to have that debate, and I am very happy to lead it.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Anna Soubry and Philip Davies

Tuesday 11th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Anna Soubry]

No, it certainly is not, and I have given my views. The hon. Gentleman will know that like many decisions on public health, these are complicated matters. Most importantly, it is vital that we take the public with us. I have said before that I welcome a debate, and perhaps he and the hon. Member for Newport West (Paul Flynn) might come to you, Mr Speaker, and ask for a debate in this Chamber or in Westminster Hall. Let us have the debate, because taking the public with us is always important when we make these sorts of difficult and controversial decisions.

[Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)]

Does the Minister agree that some of the proposed standardised packaging is more colourful than the existing packaging, and given that we have a display ban on cigarettes, what on earth is the point of having standard packaging for something that cannot be displayed?

Childhood Obesity and Diabetes

Debate between Anna Soubry and Philip Davies

Wednesday 24th April 2013 Westminster Hall

[Anna Soubry]

Yes, I agree, and I also think that there is no doubt that there is a link between being overweight or obesity and mental health. Which comes first, I do not know, but it is certainly all connected.

The call for action on obesity set out the steps that we are taking to help people to make healthy choices. That is what we aim to do: provide people with the education and knowledge they need, then ensure that they have the opportunities and options to make healthy choices. We have the national child measurement programme; we have change for life. The hon. Member for Strangford may like to know that 1 million families have joined change for life, and 684,000 people have downloaded the “Be food smart” application.

There is much more that we can do, and obesity in children is one of my absolute top priorities. I want to know why we have stopped weighing pregnant women. It seems absolutely bonkers. I am looking at the advice that we give to new mothers on how to feed their babies, and I am also looking at the role of health visitors, midwives and our great NHS workers. As I have said, in Rotherham there is a wonderful project, which anyone who has an interest in this subject really needs to go and see, because one of the things that is happening there is that everything is integrated. The project has been up and running for three to four years, and the NHS, dieticians, GPs, nurses and health visitors all work with schools, teachers and the local authority—in many ways, it is driven by the local authority. It is a wonderful experience, where the project workers do not demonise food, but look with kindness and care at the causes of problems. They help people, not only with their diet through the information that they provide, but by helping them to exercise.

I have completely run out of time. In no way have I completed my speech, and I apologise profusely for that. However, I pay credit and tribute to everybody who has signed up for the responsibility deal. There is much more that we can do; I completely accept that. Nevertheless, I would say that the labelling on packaging is something that we are particularly proud of. We are getting a standardised system that will enable people to make healthy choices and take responsibility. I could talk about schools and the great work that they are doing, but that will have to be the subject of a letter.

[Philip Davies (in the Chair)]

Order. We now come to the next debate.

Transparency and Consistency of Sentencing

Debate between Anna Soubry and Philip Davies

Thursday 2nd February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Philip Davies]

I share many of my hon. Friend’s concerns and I am certainly concerned that many people are anxious to get back into custody. There are an awful lot of reasons for that, one of which he has given. Some might argue that another reason why people are so keen to get back into prison is that their quality of life in prison is far better than their quality of life outside prison. When 4,070 prisoners enjoy the luxury of Sky TV in their cells—not even in a communal area—we know that something is fundamentally wrong with our criminal justice system.

[Anna Soubry]

Could it not be that the quality of their life outside prison is so utterly miserable that even life behind bars is preferable to the dreadful life that they live in the community?

[Philip Davies]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. We have this wretched organisation, HM inspectorate of prisons, the members of which come down from their nine-bedroom mansions in Oxfordshire, go around the prisons and say, “Oh, it’s jolly awful in here, isn’t it? Absolutely terrible.” If those same people came from the same crime-ridden estates that people in prison tend to come from, they would probably say, “It’s jolly nice in here.” There is rather a big disconnect between the backgrounds of the people in prison and of these do-gooders, the prison inspectors.

--- Later in debate ---

[Anna Soubry]

I am grateful for the information, and I will go away and look at it, but IPPs have just not worked. The legislation was flawed. Indeed, it was so flawed that after its introduction in 2003 there was a huge growth in the prison population. What did the then Government do? Did they take an honest approach and revisit their legislation, or did they take a different, simplistic approach and say, “Goodness me! There are too many people in prison. How can we bring the numbers down?”? They effectively amended the 2003 Act with fresh legislation in 2008, which made the situation even more perverse and wrong. What the then Government introduced in 2008 was a system whereby a finding of dangerousness could not be reached for someone who would not have got four years for their offence. Let me set out what that meant. I know of a case, which I worked on myself, where the trigger offence that had brought the offender—a man who was clearly a paedophile—before the sentencing judge did not warrant more than nine months to one year. I will not bore hon. Members with the details, but the judge was able to the look at the various reports on that man, which clearly showed that he was a danger to children, and he rightly decided on an IPP. However, after the Government changed the law in 2008, somebody like that man would now serve four and a half to six months, when that is exactly the sort of person who should be behind bars for a very long time.

[Philip Davies]

I have some sympathy with the idea that people should not be languishing in prison, not doing anything for years and years and not knowing when they might be released. However, surely my hon. Friend would agree that it is far better to say to somebody, “You will be released only after you have done something to address your offending behaviour,” to give them an incentive to do so, as an IPP does, than just saying, “You’ll be released after a certain period halfway through your sentence, irrespective of whether you’ve done anything to address your offending behaviour or not.”

Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill

Debate between Anna Soubry and Philip Davies

Wednesday 29th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)]

The Lord Chancellor’s statement last week bore the worst hallmarks of a Budget speech delivered by the right hon. Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Mr Brown): all the good stuff was announced but all the catastrophes were laid out in the small print.

In his statement last week the Justice Secretary proclaimed that the best way to reduce crime is to reduce reoffending—a point to which many can, I am sure, subscribe—but his stance on indeterminate sentences shows beyond all doubt that, despite what he says, reoffending is not his main priority for the Bill or the criminal justice system. The right hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr Straw) kindly mentioned the question I put to the Secretary of State yesterday. The reoffending rates among those released from prison on indeterminate sentences are among the lowest in the criminal justice system. If the Lord Chancellor’s priority is reoffending, why on earth does he want to get rid of one of the parts of the criminal justice system with the lowest rate of reoffending?

[Anna Soubry]

Will my hon. Friend please understand this? When someone is subject to an IPP, they have no knowledge about when they will be released. Does he know that they can be released only when they are deemed no longer to be a risk to society? A relatively small number of people have been released and we can assume that they were released only because they were no longer deemed a risk to society. The reason for that is that they have been on the sort of courses that other people on IPPs have not had the benefit of. The lack of courses is the real problem.

Sentencing

Debate between Anna Soubry and Philip Davies

Monday 23rd May 2011 Commons Chamber

[Philip Davies]

The Secretary of State and I differ. He seems to think it perfectly reasonable for somebody to get eight years in prison and serve only two, but I think that it is unacceptable. [Hon. Members: “He didn’t say that.”] I am disappointed he thinks that somebody who is given an eight-year sentence should be given a 50% discount for an early plea, reducing the sentence to four years, and so be released after two. [Hon. Members: “No, he didn’t say that.”] That means two years for an eight-year sentence, which to me and most people is totally unacceptable.

[Anna Soubry]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Philip Davies]

No, there is not time.

That is what the Secretary of State is proposing. That is what happened to Gabrielle Browne, who sparked the debate when she questioned the Secretary of State—[Interruption.]

Anonymity (Arrested Persons) Bill

Debate between Anna Soubry and Philip Davies

Friday 4th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[Anna Soubry]

I was going to deal with precisely that point. I would much prefer the profession that I was once a member of to self-regulate in the way that it used to. I am grateful that a member of the PCC contacted me to talk about the code of conduct. I think that in 2003 there was much consideration of a change to the code of conduct following the arrest, under the Terrorism Act 2000, of various people, I think in Birmingham. Unfortunately, that never resulted in anything. With respect to those whom I used to work with, and the profession that I am proud to have once been a member of, I am afraid that we have gone way beyond self-regulation.

I wish that the media would regulate themselves. To be blunt, I wish that people would not buy the newspapers or watch the television news programmes that they then condemn for the type of coverage given to the first man arrested in the Bristol case, but unfortunately that will not happen. We could just wait for common sense to prevail and for the previous convention to be returned to, but my fear is that other people will suffer in the meantime in the way that he has suffered. That is why I believe that it behoves this place to look at how we can improve the law to ensure that this mischief is cured once and for all.

I might have to explain, although perhaps not to everyone in this place, why it is wrong for people who are arrested to have their names published in the newspapers. A slur is placed on them, because the attitude that there is no smoke without fire always prevails. At this juncture, I should explain that the police must have reasonable suspicion before arresting someone, but there is a good argument that they are perhaps a little too keen to secure an arrest. Members may remember the expression, which was used in newspapers and on television and the radio, that a man of such and such an age was “assisting the police with their inquiries”. There now seems to be more of a tendency in those circumstances for the police to arrest someone to secure their attendance at the police station and ensure that the provisions of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 are abided by, because being an arrested person gives that individual certain rights once they are in the police station. The police need only a reasonable suspicion to arrest someone.

However, individuals are charged only when there is at least a prima facie case, and charging normally comes towards the end of an investigation when all the evidence has been gathered and considered. In serious cases, the charging decision is shared with the Crown Prosecution Service, sometimes with leading counsel brought in so that the right charge is decided upon. The CPS and the police will have gone through various tests to decide, for instance, whether it is in the public interest to charge an individual, whether there is a reasonable chance of conviction and so on. By the time they come to charge the individual, therefore, they are a long way down the track in an investigation, and hopefully closer to securing the right person to be placed in the dock, because once someone is charged, they are very swiftly in court.

[Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)]

I do not happen to agree with my hon. Friend on the Bill, but I certainly commend her for initiating the debate. Does she not accept that the ability of newspapers and the media to publish the names of people who have been arrested is a great control on potential abuse by the police? If the police can go around arresting people and the media are not allowed to report it, that could lead to the police in certain circumstances arresting more people than is necessary, and no one would ever find out about it.

[Anna Soubry]

My hon. Friend will have read the Bill and will know that it makes provision for the police, the arrested person and the press to be able to apply to a Crown court judge for leave to publish the name and address of an arrested person if it is believed that that would be in the interests of justice or in the public interest. I will move on to the detail later, but I want to make it clear now that there are exceptions in the Bill to ensure press freedom in the right circumstances and so that the police, or the arrested person, can have a name and address published if they so wish.

[Philip Davies]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that explanation and think that this sort of debate is helpful. Would it not be better to have the presumption that those details can be reported, but that in exceptional circumstances they should not be? Surely, in the natural course of events, that is the more proportionate way around.

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[Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent South (Robert Flello), and I find myself in the unusual position—no doubt he will find it an uncomfortable position—of agreeing with an awful lot of what he said.

It is only fair that I start by congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for Broxtowe (Anna Soubry) on introducing the Bill. Although I do not particularly agree with it and take issue with many parts of it, I wish to make two points at the outset. First, she has touched on an issue of concern to a great number of people around the country. I am sure that a lot of people in both my constituency and hers accept that there is a problem and that something should be done. Secondly, I was incredibly impressed by her speech and thought that she made her case incredibly well. I am sure that many people listening to it who were neutral beforehand were persuaded of the merits of the Bill simply by the quality of her speech and argument. Unfortunately, I was not persuaded of its merits, but that probably reflects more on me than on her.

The main point on which I wish to focus is the importance of having a free press, free media and open justice. The hon. Gentleman touched on that by saying that although the Bill was considered a Ministry of Justice matter, many of the issues that it covered related to the DCMS. He was right, because an awful lot of the debate that we have heard today has been about the activities of the media as opposed to the activity of the law. As a member of the Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport, I feel strongly about that, and I commend to every hon. Member who is here today the report that the Committee published only last February, “Press standards, privacy and libel”. We looked in great detail at people’s concerns about the standards of the press.

The press are clearly not flawless—none of us is. We all make mistakes. I probably make dozens every day, some of which I do not even know about. The press are no different, and we should not expect them never to make mistakes. They will acknowledge that from time to time they get things wrong. Given the vast number of matters that they report on each day, and the vast number of articles in every newspaper, it would be extraordinary if they did not make mistakes from time to time.

However, whatever flaws there may be in the media, and whatever inconveniences those flaws occasionally cause us in politics, the principle of a free press and media in this country, operated by self-regulation rather than statutory control, is good not just for us but for the country at large. We should be wary of any attempt to interfere with that free press and media. One of the media’s great roles is to act as an essential check and balance on the state and its power. We would be in a far worse position if the media were increasingly restricted.

I made the point, to which I hope to revert in more detail, that I foresee a dangerous situation of trying to go down a route whereby the police could go around arresting people, and nobody would know about it because the media would be unable to report it. I do not know what type of country has a system under which the police can go around arresting people and it cannot be reported by the media, but it is certainly not the sort of country I want to live in.

[Anna Soubry]

Nobody will stop the police reporting that people have been arrested. The Bill’s intention is to prevent people who have been arrested from being named. Does not my hon. Friend agree that that is a profound difference?

[Philip Davies]

No, I do not agree. I do not want the decision about whether to name people who have been arrested to be left in the hands of the police. I like the fact that the media are out there, investigating what the police are doing and holding them to account and in check to ensure that their power is not being abused. The media are an essential control on the state.

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[Philip Davies]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his suggestion. That would certainly make the Bill better than it is now, but I am not entirely sure that it would totally address my concerns. I shall certainly take his intervention in the spirit in which it was intended, however, because his suggestion would be a helpful step in the right direction.

I want to talk about the effect that a blanket restriction would have on local papers. National papers cover all sorts of gossip and showbiz, but local papers are all about providing information on issues of massive importance in the local area. If a massive event had taken place in an area, attracting a great deal of local interest, the local paper would be at a huge disadvantage, compared with the websites that my hon. Friend the Member for Bury North (Mr Nuttall) mentioned, if it could not publish all the information that the public needed. Such a restriction would certainly not prevent all the rumour and innuendo from being published on the internet, perhaps on websites in other countries and all sorts of different backdrops. It would put local papers at a huge disadvantage if people in the local community could not find information in the paper that was readily available from other sources.

Not being able to name an arrested person would place a huge restriction on anything being reported about a case, because there could be a danger of inadvertently identifying the person by publishing other information. There could therefore be a danger of not reporting crimes that people ought to know about, and that would previously have attracted huge media interest. Such restrictions could have a “chilling” effect on local newspapers. They might not actually fall foul of the provisions in the Bill, but their fear of so doing could have a “chilling” effect that would prevent genuine informative reporting from taking place. That could force local communities to get their information from other sources. It would be incredibly sad if we were inadvertently to put another nail into the coffin of local newspapers, but I fear that that could happen.

I again commend to the House the Select Committee’s report on press standards, privacy and libel, and our other report on the future of local media, which will give hon. Members a feel for the dire straits that many of the regional and local media are now in. We should be very wary of doing anything that could have a negative impact on them.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bury North made an important point about the rules applying only to England and Wales and the effect on media in other countries, especially in the United Kingdom, and I am not sure whether his exchange with my hon. Friend the Member for Broxtowe on the matter was resolved satisfactorily. How would reports in newspapers in Scotland and Scottish editions be tied in? As the laws apply only to England and Wales, The Scotsman might feel emboldened to print the name of somebody who had been arrested for a high-profile crime in England that was newsworthy in Scotland. That would be an extraordinary situation, given that we live in the United Kingdom.

The fact that many Scottish editions of papers are sold in England is an added complication. The Scotsman is also sold in London, as many people here want to buy it. Is the market for which that paper was intended the key factor? Would the law be breached by a newspaper that was intended for a Scottish market but that had somehow found its way into England? Would there be a due diligence defence? The Bill is unclear on that. We might end up with a strange anomaly whereby information that people are not allowed to know in England is available through print or broadcast media in Scotland. There is neither rhyme nor reason to such circulation being legitimate in Scotland, but not in England.

[Anna Soubry]

The Contempt of Court Act prohibits any publication that could prejudice a fair trial in current court proceedings. Therefore, the press in Scotland do not print anything that could fall foul of that Act, as the publication concerned might be sold or made available in England and Wales. With great respect to my hon. Friend, he is putting a red herring into the pond.

[Philip Davies]

The hon. Lady seems to be arguing for the Government to change the Contempt of Court Act. If so, she should say that. I do not know whether the Minister would be receptive. However, we are discussing not that, but whether to introduce a new piece of legislation, which is entitled to be seen in isolation. She might know how matters will be interpreted by the courts, in which case she is in a better position than I am: I never cease to be amazed by how the courts interpret certain pieces of legislation.

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[Philip Davies]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. One need only visit any newsstand in London to see a huge number of foreign newspapers being sold. Because they are being sold in this country, those editions might well be covered by the Bill—

[Anna Soubry]

They are.

[Philip Davies]

But it is a question of how effectively that would be enforced. I do not know whether a claim that the paper that had been caught out had been intended for a foreign audience might serve as a “due diligence” defence. It is impossible to know that at this stage.

[Philip Davies]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that helpful intervention. The Bill, of course, does not have that benefit, as it applies only to England and Wales.

As the vast majority of newspapers throughout the United Kingdom have signed up to the code of practice of the Press Complaints Commission, there is bound to be some uniformity in their behaviour, whether they happen to be in England, Scotland or Wales. There is no way that the press would sign up to the provisions in the Bill as part of their code of conduct, and the Scottish papers would therefore feel no need to observe those provisions. I still feel that there is a potential for anomalies. Indeed, such anomalies already appear frequently in the newspapers.

Barely a week goes by without the appearance of some salacious story about a celebrity—a footballer, a broadcaster or some wealthy individual—who has issued an injunction with the aim of preventing the publication of information that has been passed to the newspapers. More often than not, after a few days the identity of the person concerned comes to public recognition through the internet. The story is published in a foreign country, and then turns up in chat rooms and rumour mills.

I do not know a great deal about websites of that kind, being a fully paid-up member of the Luddites, but what I do know is that, by one means or another, the names of such individuals tend to come to the surface at some point. It has always struck me as extraordinary that when everyone in the pub—virtually everyone everywhere—knows the identity of some individual who is involved in one thing or another, the only place where no one can discover it is the newspaper, because of some bizarre injunction.

[Anna Soubry]

I struggle to believe that the hon. Gentleman can believe—and I am sure that he will correct me—that the coverage that we saw in the media of events in Bristol in relation to that first arrested man was right.

[Philip Davies]

My hon. Friend made a very good point about the case in Bristol. As I said at the beginning of my speech, I am not claiming—and I do not believe that anyone is claiming—that the media are without flaw, and never make mistakes. The media have made some horrendous mistakes, as they themselves will accept. We need only consider the case of Madeleine McCann. The press made some horrific mistakes in their reporting of that case, and I think that they would be the first to acknowledge it.

No matter how hard my hon. Friend tries, we will never have a system in which the media are perfect, and everything that is reported is accurate and for the public good. There will always be instances in which the media make mistakes, and we make mistakes. We all make mistakes in life. The only people who do not make any mistakes in life are those who do not make any decisions. Anyone who makes decisions makes mistakes, and the press are just as liable to make them as the next person—as are politicians, I might add. The thrust of my argument is about the bigger picture: a free and open press and an open justice system are far more worth while than attempts to try to restrict them, no matter how good the motives behind that restriction.