Public Order Bill

Lord Horam Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 1st November 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Horam (Con)]

My Lords, I do not normally speak in debates on police Bills and bring no particular knowledge or background to this debate. However, I want to say a few words because I am aware, as someone who lives in London, of the sheer irritation—at times, fury—of ordinary people at some of the matters we are discussing. The noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, just now and the noble Lord, Lord Blair of Boughton, earlier made the point that people are so annoyed that there is a danger that they will take matters into their own hands—indeed, they have done so on a number of occasions. Noble Lords will be aware of such instances.

On the whole, I speak on behalf of the proverbial man or woman on the Clapham omnibus. I live in south Fulham, so I am very aware of the views of such people, as the 295 goes past the end of my street. In sum, they are in favour of action on climate change. Although the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, has left her seat, I see that the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, is still there; I strongly agree with many of the points they have made in the House over the last few months. I was particularly pleased that there was an immediate reversal by the new Prime Minister of the position on fracking. That is entirely sensible and I entirely support it. It is ridiculous to do fracking in a small country such as this, however sensible it may be in the vastness of America.

I think that people broadly support the concerns about climate change which protesters are trying to bring to our attention, but they are also furious at the unreasonable way in which they are protesting. To see if my view was correct, I googled the opinion polls and found that, indeed, 66% of people supported action on climate change or were worried about it, but only 13% supported the methods being deployed by Extinction Rebellion and Just Stop Oil, and 54% opposed those methods either strongly or less strongly. I think that roughly summarises public opinion. Therefore, it is sensible for the Government to respond to that concern and fury from ordinary people with a Bill which, after all, has very narrow, specifically defined powers and is, in a way, an appendix to the larger Bill we discussed previously. In a way, the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, is right that the Government really have no alternative, when public safety is an issue, to respond in the way they are trying to.

So, why is there opposition to the Bill? First, some say—as the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, and the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, argued—that there are already sufficient powers to deal with this matter. However, that does not seem to be entirely satisfactory; why else are we having this endless display of problems in London? It was said that there were 30 consecutive days of action on these issues in London alone. It cannot be the case that the police are so bad that they are simply not prosecuting people using the powers they already have; in other words, there is dissatisfaction with the law, and, as has already been said, some aspects of it need to be more clearly defined to help the police. They may be small, incremental changes to existing laws, but none the less, clarity in this area is essential.

The second—and perhaps major—point was put to us all by the lobby group Justice, which circulated a paper that said

“the Bill would serve to give the police carte blanche to target protesters—similar laws can be found in Russia and Belarus.”

That is a little over the top, frankly. A comparison with Belarus and Russia is somewhat beyond the pale, particularly at a time such as this. The briefing went on to be specific, saying that the Bill would apply to community festivals, Pride marches, vigils and pickets. Incidentally, I take the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Hendy, and I certainly would not want the Bill to apply to picketing in the way he described. I would be concerned if the Bill were ever to be used in that way, or in what I would call the normal arena of protest—demonstrations, marches and all the rest of it—which we are used to and is part of the traditional British way of life.

However, while people have made that comparison with those countries, I think it is simply not true to argue that that British way of life is extensively compromised by this particularly narrow Bill. First, the people we are talking about are very few in number. There are a small number of people who specifically design disruptive actions of a particular kind. Secondly, they usually give no warning for their activities. By contrast, if you have a march or a demonstration, you have a large number of people and usually have sufficient warning so that the police can understand and police it properly. Those are all distinctions between what we are talking about here and the normal process of demonstration and marching. While it is true that an individual could be banned under the Bill, it is certainly not the case that a whole area of activity—a protest group, march or demonstration—could be banned. That does not follow from the provisions of the Bill.

So, I am concerned about some of the remarks made by the noble Lord, Lord Coaker—who is always worried, rightly, about these things, which I praise and commend him for; it is good that someone is worried about them—and equally by the thoughtful speech of my noble friend Lord Balfe, which I followed with great interest. We should be concerned and watch this with great care. None the less, I think that the common-sense approach here is to respond, as the Government have done, to a specific set of disruptive and damaging actions which, in my view, are counterproductive and do not really bring forward the case they are trying to argue. I not only believe but would forecast that, despite the Bill, Britain will remain a beacon of liberty in the world.