Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Bill

Lord Greaves Excerpts

Wednesday 20th November 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hamwee]

My noble friend is absolutely right. I apologise to the Committee. There is such enthusiasm to move on today that I was moving too fast. I must give my noble friend an opportunity to accept or possibly reject my Amendment 22E. It would provide in Clause 21 that the court must receive evidence about suitability. There must be a proportionality element in the requirements provided in the orders. I may be told that this yet again is something that is dealt with in guidance.

Amendment 22G takes us to the duration of the orders. We are presented in the case of under-18s with a fixed period of not less than two years or an indefinite period. I suggest that there should be a limit for everyone, as there is for under-18s. The criminal behaviour order can include a lot of requirements and restraints, which could, if they go on indefinitely, have a disproportionate impact. To have something hanging over one’s head indefinitely could be a disincentive—you could give up hope of ever getting it right.

Amendment 22H would provide that reviews are not confined to under-18s, which continues more of that thought. Amendments 22J and 22K are consequential on that. I beg to move.

[Lord Greaves]

My Lords, Amendment 22KA is a modest attempt to help the Government to get their legislation correct. It refers to the review of criminal behaviour orders which has to take place under Clause 27. Clause 28(2) states:

“The chief officer, in carrying out a review under section 27, must act in cooperation with the council for the local government area in which the offender lives or appears to be living; and the council must co-operate in the carrying out of the review”.

Clause 28(4) states:

“In this section ‘local government area’ means—

(a) in relation to England, a district or London borough, the City of London, the Isle of Wight and the Isles of Scilly”.

That definition is archaic and does not apply to the local government map of England as it now stands. It misses out large tracts where there are no districts and where there are unitary counties.

There are other parts of this legislation—under IPNAs and community protection notices, for example—that get it right and refer to counties where there are no districts. They clearly have to be added. My amendment adds this so that large parts of England are simply not missed out. Since the Bill refers at the moment to districts or London boroughs, I assume that the district or lowest level is meant. Where there is a unitary authority only—a county such as Cornwall, Northumberland or various others—that needs to be added. This is in the spirit of being as helpful as possible to the Government, as I always am.

[Lord Rosser]

I am very interested to hear the Minister’s response on all the issues that have been raised, particularly about the duration of a criminal behaviour order. This has already been stated. For those who reach the age of 18 there is a,

“fixed period of not less than 2 years, or … an indefinite period”—

then it says in brackets—

“(so that the order has effect until further order)”.

I am not quite sure what that means. What is the further order that is envisaged? It does not say, “until further notice” but “until further order”. Perhaps the Minister will clarify what that actually means.

As far as the order being allowed to go on for an indefinite period, the Minister has been quite eloquent during the passage of the Bill, telling us all about some of the existing provisions, how they are not working and how they are not having any effect. Bearing in mind that it says in the draft guidance that the criminal behaviour order,

“is aimed at tackling the most serious and persistent offenders where their behaviour has brought them before a criminal court”,

then I suggest that if such an order has been in effect for five years but has not had any impact and has not managed to tackle the most serious and persistent offenders, it is unlikely that it will do so beyond five years.

On how long the order period should last, if the Minister is determined that the facility should be there for it to continue for longer than, say, a period of five years and to go on indefinitely, does he not think it appropriate that there is a proper review to justify the need for it to continue on the basis that one would have thought five years a reasonable time to show the effectiveness, or otherwise, of an order?

--- Later in debate ---

I turn to the modest, but always welcome, attempt by my noble friend Lord Greaves to help us along the way in some of the drafting of the Bill; when he speaks on issues of local government, it is with a great deal of experience and expertise. I assure my noble friend that he has raised yet again a very helpful and technical point on the definition of a “local government area” in Clause 28. We will of course return to this on Report, reflecting on his comments.

[Lord Greaves]

I am grateful for the Minister’s comments, but in order to save time on Report why does he not just accept the amendment now?

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon]

With all things legalistic and legislative, my noble friend will agree with me that it is important, as he himself stated, to get it right. Let me assure him that we will certainly take into account his insight and expertise in ensuring that in our drafting we correct any omission, if indeed that is the case.

I hope, based on the explanations I have given, that my noble friend will be minded to withdraw the amendment.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Smith of Basildon]

My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 22M and also comment on whether Clause 32 should stand part of the Bill. I will make a very similar point to that made by my noble friend Lord Harris. We do not have an issue with the principle of dispersal powers. In fact, we introduced such powers back in 2004, although I recognise that they were pretty controversial at that time. Our worry is that the new power now being proposed by the Government can be authorised much more easily than the existing one and also for longer. The issue we are raising is that of proper and effective democratic oversight. Local authorities must and should be consulted by the police before the issuing of dispersal orders. That is the process that currently exists.

What I find curious is that the Home Affairs Committee, in its pre-legislative scrutiny, recommended that there should be a duty to consult local authorities on applications for dispersal powers of more than six hours. The Government’s response to that comment by the Home Affairs Select Committee in the other place was that they would ensure that the legislation allowed for that. In fact, it does not. It would appear that the commitment that the Government gave in their response to the Home Affairs Select Committee has not been brought forward in the Bill—unless it is in the pile of amendments that were issued very late last night for debate today, but I do not see them grouped here at the moment. Unless an amendment is coming forward from the Government, can the Minister explain why a response was made to the Home Affairs Select Committee to do something that does not appear to be in the Bill now?

When evidence sessions were held during the Committee stage of the Bill in the other place, there was no suggestion that the existing power was not working properly. The police have also said that working with the local authority really helps them get community consensus and support when a dispersal order is needed. That is why we consider Amendment 22M to be so important. Why fix something that is not broken? If there is an issue, why try to change the process? If the Minister can tell me that he and the Government have received representations from organisations or individuals that suggest that the current provisions are inflexible and inadequate, that would help to explain why the Government have made such changes. If he can tell us who those organisations or individuals were, what changes they sought and for what reasons, that would perhaps help to explain why a power has now been proposed that is different from the existing one.

I was reading through the debate in Committee in the other place. Damian Green, as the Minister, said then that the powers were designed,

“to allow police officers to react to a dynamic situation”.—[Official Report, Commons, Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Bill Committee, 27/6/13; col. 240.]

Have there been complaints that there has not been a response, as the Minister would like? If that is the case, there is a concern that this could lead to the powers being used recklessly and in inappropriate circumstances if there is not that check. Can the Minister say on how many occasions there has been a situation where a community has been at threat or in danger because the local authority could not be consulted about a dispersal power over the week and the power then could not be used? Have there been such cases that have led the Government to bringing forward a very different kind of procedure now?

The noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, and my noble friend Lord Harris raised the question of locality. There is concern that the meaning of “locality” is not quite clear or is wider than necessary. If the Minister can address that, it would be helpful.

[Lord Greaves (LD)]

The noble Baroness was not in the House when we dealt at some length with the question of what “locality” means, specifically in relation to town greens and village greens in the Countryside and Rights of Way Act when it went through this House rather a long time ago—about 13 years ago—and the Commons Act more recently. The courts had got themselves into terrible difficulties about the definition of “locality”, about whether localities and neighbourhoods are the same thing and about the question of neighbourhoods within localities. There was a lot of abstruse discussion and debate and I am not sure that we actually clarified the matter. The important thing is that locality is not the same as location. A location is a specific place on the surface of the Earth. A locality, however you define it, is wider in some respect or other.