Public Order Bill

Lord Paddick Excerpts

3rd reading
Tuesday 21st February 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Anderson of Ipswich (CB)]

My Lords, I want to say three things. First, I pay tribute to the noble Baroness, Lady Sugg, for the remarkable job she did after the contentious committee hearing on this clause. She forged a result which, although certainly not perfect, and which continues to evoke strong feelings, had the support of a very great majority of your Lordships.

Secondly, I thank the Minister for taking on board Amendment 9, which is surely not controversial but mends the hole in this Bill by ensuring that the same incidents are not taken into account for successive serious disruption prevention orders.

My third point is also addressed to the Minister, but I suspect more particularly to his ministerial colleagues. On both stop and search and serious disruption prevention orders, your Lordships’ House has not obstructed clear government policy but has found a way—with the benefit of our collective experience—to leave the police with the powers the Government say they need, while removing the excessive and unnecessary elements of each power. The things we removed are no-suspicion stop and search and the power to trigger SDPOs on the basis of activity that does not meet the criminal threshold.

I remind the Minister that all this was passed with overwhelming Cross-Bench support. All three amendments on these subjects were signed or supported by two Lord Chief Justices, two further judges of our highest court and a former Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, my noble friend Lord Hogan-Howe, who, in my experience, knows exactly what he is talking about on these issues. The three amendments collectively attracted 162 Cross-Bench votes, with only eight against. Of course, these Benches are only a small part of the House, but not one, I hope, that anyone would willingly confuse with a crypto-anarchist front. I believe that the Minister, with his own policing experience, will see the force of these views, and I ask him to convey that to his colleagues in the Commons. I hope that this Bill can become law without tiresome ping-pong and with these amendments in place.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, we wholeheartedly support all the amendments in this group. Noble Lords often talk about the tremendous work the noble Baroness, Lady Sugg, has done on this Bill, although I realise they have not said it in those terms.

It may come as a surprise to Members of this House that I consider myself to be a Christian. I rather overdid it: I was baptised as an infant; then I became a Baptist and was baptised by total immersion; and then I went to Oxford and was confirmed in the Church of England. It was belt and braces as far as I am concerned. This legislation is not anti-Christian and, in respect of people who privately pray, my understanding is that prayer works very effectively outside of a 150-metre radius of an abortion clinic.

I have to apologise to the House: I should have been on my guard on Report. I refer to the debate on 7 February, when the Minister talked about the Government having tabled amendments

“which seek to allay some of the concerns expressed by your Lordships.”

I think the Minister knows what is coming. He went on to say that the second amendment, Amendment 58,

“reduces the relevant period of past conduct which is considered for SDPOs from within five years to within three years … It is the Government’s view that these amendments represent a substantive offer and address the main criticisms of SDPOs”.—[Official Report, 7/2/23; cols. 1147-48.]

Regrettably, when it came to Amendment 58, the Minister “not moved” his own amendment. I was not quick enough to intervene to rescue it, so that amendment is lost. It was not part of an amended part of the Bill, so it cannot be amended here at Third Reading, and it cannot be amended in the Commons either. As I said, I apologise for not being quick enough to spot that mistake. Having said that, we support all the amendments before the House today.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)]

My Lords, we too support all the amendments today. I open by thanking the noble Baroness, Lady Sugg, for all her work on this matter; I know that she has worked tirelessly between both Houses and both sides of this House. I am glad that we have reached this point and, to that extent, I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Cormack.

I reiterate what the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, said: plenty of Christians support the amendments and there are a number I know who would take exception to people describing them as somehow not as good Christians as those who wish to protest by praying within 150 metres of an abortion clinic. It is perfectly clear that you can pray wherever you like, but outside 150 metres of an abortion clinic.

I would like to reinforce the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, who talked about the strength of the votes at earlier stages of the Bill. He highlighted stop and search and SDPOs, and the strength of support from across the Cross Benches, including from many very senior former judges. I hope that when the Minister wraps up, at this stage or the next, he says something or gives us some hint about how far the Government will go in recognising the concerns that this House has expressed.

--- Later in debate ---

There should be no doubt about the merits of the Bill’s ultimate objectives: namely to better balance the rights of protesters with the rights of individuals to go about their lives free from disruption or harm. Blocking motorways and slow walking in roads delays our life-saving emergency services, stops people getting to work and drains police resources, and the British people are rightly fed up with it. It is more important than ever that the Bill moves swiftly to become law.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister and his Bill team for listening to at least some of the concerns noble Lords have raised, and for the way in which they have responded to them. When similar restrictions on protests were considered by this House in the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act, the Government were defeated on 14 occasions. This time, the Government were defeated eight times, but that was only because we did not feel there was enough time to vote against other measures that we were very concerned about. However, I thank the Minister and his team. I thank Elizabeth Plummer in the Liberal Democrat Whips’ Office, who has supported me throughout. I thank His Majesty’s loyal Opposition for the constructive way in which noble Lords of the Labour Party have worked together with us to ensure that the democratic right to protest has been maintained.

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

My Lords, I start with some brief remarks. I very much thank the Minister, his colleagues on the Government Front Bench and the Bill team for their help and time during the passage of the Bill—including today’s clarificatory amendments which the Minister brought forward. It is an example of how this can and should be done, even when there are genuine disagreement between us. The briefings and discussions we had helped inform debate and, I hope, have led to better legislation—which is indeed what we all want. I thank the Minister very much for that; it is much appreciated.

I thank my noble friend Lord Ponsonby for his support and important contributions. I say to the Chamber that he brings a calmness to my more excitable character, which is extremely helpful. In thanking him, I also thank our office for its support, and in particular, over the last few weeks, Liz Cronin. I thank many of my noble friends for their contributions to this debate, particularly my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, and his colleagues, and I thank him for the remarks he just made. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, for the contributions she has made, and a number of Cross-Benchers—including the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, who has been mentioned, the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, and others.

To those very senior former judges, including the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, I say that I very much appreciated my crash course in the law; I hope that I have appeared to know what I am talking about, which is always a start. The interventions of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, and those of many of the other senior judiciary members who we have here, make a huge contribution to the difficult debates that we have, even where we disagree between ourselves. This is an extremely important Bill and the debate will no doubt continue as it returns to the other place for its consideration of our changes.

I want to emphasise—the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, mentioned this—that the debates here and the changes made reflect a genuine attempt to address where the line should be drawn between the right to protest and the right of others to go about their daily lives. It was not about those supporting a law-abiding majority and those putting the rights of protestors first. Across the world, democracy and the right to protest are non-existent or under threat. In our great democracy, tensions arise and anger around protests can sometimes, quite rightly, provoke public outrage. In seeking to deal with that, however, we must not, even inadvertently, damage freedoms that we all cherish.

I hope that the other place will reflect carefully not only on the actual amendments that we have made but on the debates that took place around them. They were debates, yes, on how we deal with the challenges emerging particularly from recent protests but also, crucially, on maintaining the democratic traditions of which we are all so rightly proud.