Crime and Policing Bill

Lord Carter of Haslemere Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 22nd January 2026 Lords Chamber

We already have a system that allows courts to protect safety where it is genuinely at risk without abandoning openness, accountability or equality before the law. For all these reasons, I support the stand part notices and submit that these clauses should not stand part of the Bill.

[Lord Carter of Haslemere (CB)]

My Lords, I respectfully disagree with the proposition that these clauses should be removed from the Bill. My views will come as no surprise to the 10 noble Lords who were present in the Chamber on Tuesday night at 11.15 pm to debate my amendment on why police officers who use excessive force on the spur of the moment, in the honest but mistaken belief that their use of force was reasonable, should be sentenced differently. There will be an opportunity to debate that further at on Report.

The underlying principles here as to whether anonymity should be given to police firearms officers in criminal proceedings where they are charged with a qualifying offence are exactly the same. As the House of Lords Judicial Committee said 30 years ago in the case of Lee Clegg, law enforcement officers deserve to be treated differently, since they go on patrol to assist in the maintenance of law and order with no intention of killing or wounding anyone. They face evil people who get out of bed with the full intention of trying to kill them and us. That life and death situation does not normally confront the rest of us. These officers have to make split-second decisions in order to protect us and deserve, at the very least, to be given anonymity if they are charged with a criminal offence, so that they and their families are protected from adverse publicity during those proceedings.

The last thing we want is such brave officers being deterred from volunteering for firearms training when the National Police Chiefs’ Council says that police forces across England and Wales are grappling with a significant shortage of firearms officers, exacerbated by the lack of legal protections afforded to them, particularly regarding criminal and misconduct proceedings.

Clauses 152 to 155 are a welcome recognition by the Government that police firearms officers are in a unique position. As I have said, I would take this further to address how such officers are sentenced, but that must wait for Report. In the meantime, the modest protection of anonymity during criminal proceedings, with an exception built in where anonymity would not be in the interest of justice, is a proportionate measure which is long overdue.