Public Order Bill

Debate between Lord Coaker and Lord Skidelsky

Committee stage
Wednesday 16th November 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Skidelsky (CB)]

My Lords, I will speak briefly in support of Amendment 21 from the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, to which I put my name. The principle it seeks to uphold is that the offending person must be the one committing the offence or intending to commit the offence, rather than somebody else connected with that person. That is a very important point, because “in connection with” is another of these vague phrases that have crept into this kind of legislation. It is also there in counterterrorist legislation. How connected? Friend, lover, colleague, co-religionist? What is the nature of the connection? All these things are undefined. What counts as a malicious connection? That is why we want this amendment.

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank those who have supported the various amendments in my name. I very much supported the comments that the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, made when she opened the group. Similarly, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, for his support and the arguments he put forward on the various amendments. I also thank the noble Lords, Lord Beith and Lord Skidelsky, and the noble Baroness, Lady Fox. She made some very good comments about “serious disruption” and “key national infrastructure”.

This is the first contribution I have made. The Minister said that the Government had listened to the House of Lords by withdrawing amendments when they came up in the Bill at the beginning of the year, putting them through the Commons and then bringing them to the Lords, that constitutionally that was the right way of doing things, and therefore that the Government had correctly brought the Bill forward to the Lords. I say to him that we as the Lords have a constitutional right to review legislation that comes from the Commons, to say where we think it is wrong, to put forward amendments and to seek clarity where there is none.

That has been the purpose of all the amendments put forward here this afternoon as we go into the evening. Each amendment put forward has sought that clarity of definition—what the Government actually intend and mean—so that as this law goes through and the Bill passes, as it will, it will be a better Bill that delivers what the Government want. That is what we seek to do with all the various amendments.

The key question that will keep coming back to the Government is: why is the Bill necessary? There is no dispute in this Chamber—we all totally and utterly feel that the Just Stop Oil protesters went too far, and that was serious disruption that was unacceptable. It is an Aunt Sally, or whatever the politically correct term is, to say, as the Government sometimes do, that they are in favour of the great British public who object to having their lives disrupted while there is a group of others, in this Chamber or elsewhere, who seek to be on the side of the protesters instead. We are all on the side of the public. We all agree that there is a right to protest but that there should be limits to it, and there will be a debate about where that should come.

The third group deals with the scope of the offences. Again, there is a series of questions for the Government in this group about where we are with the drafting and the scope of the offences. As I say, we keep coming back to the need to draft good law and the need for clarity, not offences so broad that they impinge unreasonably on the British public’s rights and are unenforceable. Other key issues include focusing police resources on where they actually matter, not criminalising lawful behaviour or peaceful protest by members of the British public who are causing minor disruption. Our various amendments seek to probe the Government so that we can consider what to bring forward on Report.

Amendments 18 and 20 deal with being equipped to lock on. Currently, Clause 2 provides that an offence of being equipped for locking on takes place where a person is carrying an item that “may” be used “by any person” in the course of a locking-on offence or “in connection with” such an offence, or which may be used “by any person” in the course of or in connection with a locking-on offence. The amendments that I have tabled and others in the group would narrow that scope so that an offence was committed only where a person was carrying an item with the intention that it “will” be used to commit an offence by the person carrying it. As I say, those amendments are to probe the scope of the offence. Why is the word “may” there, not “will”? Why is the phrase “in connection with” used?

What does “by any person” mean? Any person in the group? Any person standing next to them? Any person who happens to be standing nearby? We heard from my noble friend Lady Armstrong about the difficulties one has where you just imply that someone in the group may be associated with a particular person, and the problems that causes. As my noble friend Lord Ponsonby said to me, there is already a well-used piece of legislation containing the offence of being equipped. He would know, as a magistrate. Why does that legislation not work here? Time and again, the Minister has been asked to say why the current legislation is inadequate to deal with such situations.

Last Friday when Just Stop Oil called off its protest, I heard one of the protesters say on Radio 4—it was the “Today” programme, and the Minister can go back and listen to it—that among the reasons why they did so were the number of people who had been arrested and the number who were in jail or on remand. They said that was having an impact on the ability to carry out protests. Is that not part of the existing legislation dealing with these problems? Maybe it should have been used or enforced quicker but that is a process issue and a policing issue, not a legislative one.

Under current drafting, if an item is not used and absolutely no disruption is caused to anyone, has the person committed a criminal offence because something in their possession may have been used by someone else—not even themselves—to lock on? Is that a criminal offence or not? What does “in connection with” a locking-on offence mean? What activity does that cover?

The classic example that we have all used is a bike lock. We keep coming back to that because it has not been properly addressed. If a person walks through Parliament Square with a bike lock, they could be caught by that clause—is that not the case? Will it be up to that member of the public to prove to a police officer that they have no intent even though it might be used by someone else, not even to commit locking on but for an action that is somehow connected to it? Again, clarity is needed in the law because that police officer will be required to enforce it.

It is worth noting that the clause does not include a reasonable excuse defence. In practice, that is what happens when someone has a reasonable excuse, such as they work close by and own a bike. How is that going to work if there is no reasonable excuse defence available in the clause. Or have I misread it? Asking these questions is, after all, the purpose of Committee.

Amendment 52 concerns the obstruction of major transport works. Clause 6 makes it an offence to obstruct any actions that are

“reasonably necessary … in connection with”

constructing or maintaining transport works. The amendment would remove “in connection with”. Again, this is to probe what actions that may cover. Clause 6 currently provides that it is an offence to obstruct a person

“taking any steps that are reasonably necessary for the purposes of facilitating, or in connection with, the construction or maintenance of any major transport works”.

What does “in connection with” mean? Imagine the list of activities that could be considered as any step that was reasonably necessary in connection with maintaining a transport work. If a local protest prevents a person from painting a railway generator for a few hours, is that now a criminal offence? As the JCHR said:

“For example, the offence would be committed by moving any apparatus that ‘relates to’ construction or maintenance of major transport works (such as a shovel, a broom or a traffic cone) or, indeed, moving any apparatus (even if unrelated to the works) that belongs to a person acting under the authority of the person in charge of the works.”


Is the JCHR wrong to have used those examples? As I say, poor, open-ended drafting will make these offences unusable, casting the net so wide that it means that in no way is the Bill focused on the small number of highly disruptive protesters who are purposefully breaking the law.