Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

Baroness Northover Excerpts

Wednesday 15th December 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Falconer of Thoroton]

This provision introduces civil sanctions in relation to criminal offences set out in Schedule 9. As I understand it, the criminal offences, of which there are 12 in paragraph 8, are designed to ensure that either permitted participants or authorised—

Sorry, there is not much point me asking a question if you are chattering away.

[Baroness Northover]

I have got two ears.

[Lord Falconer of Thoroton]

She has got two ears. I agree with that. I will go on. I am sure that the fact that she has two ears has some significance to the story.

There are 12 offences identified in paragraph 8. The purpose of the offences, as I understand it—though I stand to be corrected by the Minister—is that the only people who should be spending money in relation to the referendum are either permitted participants or authorised participants. Therefore the purpose of the criminal offences is to prevent expenditure by anyone other than those people. The way that this is dealt with, as a matter of the criminal law, is to say that if there is a transaction where in effect somebody else’s money is spent, either directly or through a permitted participant or an authorised participant, it is made a criminal offence by paragraph 8 of Schedule 9.

The essence of each of the criminal offences, as I read them—again, I stand to be corrected—is that you have to know if you are committing a criminal offence that either as an authorised or a permitted participant you are using somebody else’s money or as an individual providing the money you know that you should not be spending it on the referendum. Know or ought to know, I should say. What I am interested to know, and that seems a perfectly sensible structure, is what the circumstances are in which it will be decided to bring criminal proceedings and what the circumstances are in which it will be decided to employ a civil sanction. Obviously it will depend on the facts in every case but if know or ought to know is part of it, what distinctions will people rely on in order to determine whether it is civil or criminal? This will be important, because paragraph 8 is obviously intended to be a deterrent to people from breaking the law in relation to the limits that apply—