Public Order Bill (Seventh sitting)

Sarah Jones Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 21st June 2022 Public Bill Committees

[Anne McLaughlin]

Yes, but it does not have a number outside. I was unable to be here last week due to a diary clash, and I apologise for that, although I advised the Committee.

I recall that the previous week the Minister and others in the debate and here today suggested that there is some hypocrisy going on. That is my reason for saying a few words today. I want to explain why they are wrong in their assessment. That said, the measure applies to England and Wales only, so I will abstain in any vote because, as most colleagues know, the SNP does not vote on matters that do not directly impact on their constituents. However, I will put my name to a motion similar to this at the SNP conference later this year.

The position is not hypocritical, because there is a world of difference between somebody being harassed, as the Minister puts it, by protesters, and being told an airport is not doing enough for climate change. There is a world of difference between that and somebody being told with words, verbally, on a poster, or implied by presence, “You are killing your child. You individually are responsible for the death of your child.” That is what those protesters are saying.

I know women who have had abortions, and even those certain from the outset that it is absolutely the only and right choice for them, wrestle with their conscience, and they live with that decision forever. The guilt is there already; they do not need somebody else to make them feel even more guilty, yet that is what the protesters do. Even the ones who silently stand and pray quite often have posters with pictures of foetuses and the message that abortion is murder. It is cruel in the extreme.

Nobody changes their mind once they have got to the clinic. Nobody who turns up at the clinic and who is attacked by someone verbally, on posters or by their presence, stops and says, “Wait a minute—you are right. I am killing my child. I am going to cross the road to you and ask for your help.” That does not happen. It is fine for people to have those views and want to offer assistance, but not at that stage and in that way. That is why it is completely different from any other type of protest talked of in the Bill. I am sorry that I cannot vote for it. That is not much good for the hon. Member for Ealing Central and Acton, though others are not going to vote for it anyway. However, I do want to voice solidarity, because I support the gist of what she is trying to do.

[Sarah Jones (Croydon Central) (Lab)]

Given the contributions so far, I will be brief. I want to add to what the hon. Lady has just said and to try to explain that this different, because it stops people getting the medical support that they need.

I have had cause to walk into the abortion clinic in Streatham. On that occasion, I was not getting an abortion but, I promise, if I had been what I saw would have made me feel very scared, guilty and inclined not to go in. Although the protesters were not shouting and yelling, they were judging. For many women—people—that judgment means they want to run away. It was worse when we came out than when we went in. The protesters do not know what has gone on inside, so the judgment when you come out is 10 times worse than when you go in, because the protesters think that you have committed murder. This is a very different matter; it is about getting medical attention that you are entitled to. It is about your legal duty to—

[The Chair]

May I stop the hon. Lady? I remind hon. Members not to use the second person singular and use “you”. The occasional use of “you” is okay but we are now in the territory of multiple uses. Will people please stick to the protocol?

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[Sarah Jones]

Forgive me, Mr Dowd. That was wrong of me. I am going off script, which is why I did that.

We heard in evidence from Liberty that it is supportive of this new clause, because these behaviours are harassment. Even if it is not verbal, it is definitely harassment. I have felt it myself, so I think that this is a very different order of thing. It is in the same category as the kind of debates we have had about people being prevented from getting their vaccines.

I will leave it there. I am very happy to support my hon. Friend the Member for Ealing Central and Acton, as many Members from across the House have done. There is a genuine debate to be had. My hon. Friend is doing an excellent job of keeping this conversation going; it is important that we continue to have it.

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[Mrs Elphicke]

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

I move the new clause on behalf of my hon. Friends the Members for Thurrock and for Blackpool North and Cleveleys (Paul Maynard). Right hon. and hon. Members will be more than aware of the disruption and danger caused by offences involving locking on and obstructing major roads, which have caused gridlock and stopped emergency services getting through during recent severe protests.

New clause 3 seeks to ensure that the particular and additional harm of preventing emergency services—police, ambulances and the fire service—is included as an aggravating factor in the primary offences considered for conviction under clauses 1 and 3 of the Bill, rather than relying on a separate offence. The new clause would provide a more effective and appropriate reflection of the total harm caused by the additional seriousness of blocking emergency workers getting to people in need. I am grateful to the Committee for its consideration of the new clause.

[Sarah Jones]

I will keep my comments very brief. As the hon. Lady has said, the new clause would create an aggravated offence when someone in the course of locking on or obstructing major transport works impedes an emergency worker in exercising their function.

We did not support the clauses that new clause 3 relates to—those being clause 1, “Offence of locking on” and clause 3, “Obstruction etc of major transport works”. We will not be supporting the new clause today, but we believe very strongly in the principle of emergency workers being able to exercise their functions. In other parts of the Bill, we have talked about adding emergency workers to the list of critical national infrastructure necessary for the country to function as we want it to. Although we are sympathetic to the principle that emergency workers are crucial and need to be exercising their functions in any way they need to, we will not support it today because it is attached to parts of the Bill that we do not support.

[Kit Malthouse]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Dover. We all sympathise with the intentions of the new clause, initially tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool North and Cleveleys. It is completely unacceptable that a small minority of individuals cause significant disruption, and it is even more unacceptable when that disruption strays beyond delaying or inconveniencing the public and into interfering with the emergency services. We all remember well the scenes of ambulances stuck in traffic on the M25, and thank God that there was no major fire that the fire service needed to get to, or a worse incident. Such behaviour is unacceptable and the new clause seeks to ask the courts to account for this behaviour when convicting individuals for obstructing major transport works and for locking on in particular. I applaud my hon. Friend’s support for the new clause.

As I have said previously, however, acts that obstruct emergency workers from exercising their functions are sadly not new and are—happily, perhaps—already illegal under existing law. The Emergency Workers (Obstruction) Act 2006 already makes it an offence to obstruct without reasonable excuse an emergency worker such as a police officer or paramedic from responding to an emergency. It also provides an offence of hindering someone assisting an emergency worker in responding to an emergency. Anyone found guilty of those offences faces an unlimited fine.

Given that there are existing legal remedies, we do not believe it necessary to legislate to direct courts to consider using the maximum penalties available to them when sentencing individuals convicted of locking on or obstructing transport works in those scenarios. Courts can already consider a whole range of aggravating and mitigating circumstances presented to them by the prosecution and defence when deciding whether to convict a defendant and impose a sentence proportionate to their crime. When assessing cases relating to the two offences mentioned in new clause 3, courts may wish to consider impeding emergency workers as an aggravating factor, but that is a decision for them. While we understand the intention behind the new clause, we hope that my hon. Friend will withdraw it at this stage.

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These are very sensible new clauses that would just build some safeguards into what is coming.

[Sarah Jones]

I rise to support my hon. Friends the Members for Ealing Central and Acton and for Battersea on the sensibleness of the new clauses.

Requiring the Secretary of State to publish data, and requiring the establishment of an independent reviewer to assess and report annually, seems to me to be the very least that the Government should be doing when they are bringing in such a broad range of powers. We know that there is significant concern—we have debated it at length—about the extension to protests of stop and search in both its forms, including suspicionless stop and search. There are organisations and representatives of the police who are worried about the potential disproportionality of those parts of the Bill. The College of Policing and the inspectorate have all looked at stop and search and said that it can erode trust between the police and local communities and that it is disproportionate. My hon. Friend the Member for Ealing Central and Acton listed the stats on that.

Publishing the data is an easy thing to do, and I hope the Home Office would do it anyway. Establishing an independent reviewer is easy to do—Lord Geidt may be free. There will be other good people who could do the job. With such a significant expansion of police powers, it really would be alarming if we did not do those things. I hope the Government will consider new clauses 8 and 9.

[Kit Malthouse]

I will speak first to new clause 8. The Home Office continues to publish extensive data on the use of stop and search to drive transparency, as the hon. Lady for Ealing Central and Acton requested. In 2021, for the first time, we collected and published data on the age and gender of all individuals stopped and searched, alongside our long-standing collection of data on ethnicity. That allows us to create a clearer picture on how stop and search is used and how best to build on the existing trust and confidence held between the police and the community they serve.

I want to make it clear that, as with all stop and search, nobody should be stopped and searched under the new powers because of their ethnicity or on the basis of any other protected characteristic. I know that the hon. Lady did not mean to imply that the police operation of stop and search is, as she said, “racist” at the moment. There are complicated reasons that sit behind the disproportionality in stop and search, which undoubtedly exists in some parts of the country, that we need to be conscious of and address. However, she will also be aware that there are safeguards in place, including the use of body-worn video and statutory guidance in code A of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984, and those safeguards will also apply to the new powers in the Bill. Data on their use will be collected and published, broken down by age, gender and ethnicity—including the outcome of the search—as it is for existing stop-and-search powers.

[Sarah Jones]

I want to make the point that we do not actually know what causes the disproportionality. That is why the National Police Chiefs’ Council and the College of Policing are going to do a lot of work in that space. We do not have the answers, so we do not definitively know what is causing it. A lot of people suspect it is racism in the police force; a lot of people think it might be other things. We do not actually know.

[Kit Malthouse]

The hon. Lady is making exactly my point. I am afraid that the hon. Member for Ealing Central and Acton did use the word “racist” regarding the operation of stop and search. I was refuting that as a conclusion that may be drawn. There are complicated reasons behind the disproportionality in stop and search, and we all have a duty to try to understand what they may be.

Sometimes, there are statistical anomalies. There is a well-known anomaly in Dorset from a couple of years ago where a couple of drug dealers travelled down to deal drugs and they were stopped and searched. They happened to be from a BME background. Even though they were the only two people who were stopped and searched during that period, that stop and search and their apprehension as drug dealers meant that someone was 40 times more likely to be stopped and searched in that part of Dorset if they were from a BME background.

There are lots of complicated reasons that we need to understand about the disproportionality, and I am not downplaying the significance of it. As somebody who has fought crime in London during my political lifetime, I am very conscious of the impact it can have. I have sat and worked with all communities across London, particularly those affected by very serious violence, to understand the impact of stop and search. I have to say that body-worn video, in particular, is making a huge difference.

On new clause 9, I agree with the hon. Lady that independent oversight of the use of intrusive powers is essential. We all expect the police to use their stop-and-search powers as they see fit and to scrutinise their use of powers to ensure they remain focused, legitimate, proportionate and necessary. However, it is also true that having an independent body increases accountability and enhances the service officers are giving to the public.

I am pleased, therefore, to remind the Committee that we are fortunate to have two independent bodies that already perform that vital task. First, Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary and fire and rescue services inspects forces on their use of stop and search as part of their annual inspections, and makes recommendations for improvement where needed. That allows the public to see whether their local force is meeting the high standards we expect. Forces should be able to explain their use of stop and search, including any disparities, to HMIC and the public, and we expect forces to respond to the inspectorate’s recommendations with alacrity.

Secondly, the Independent Office for Police Conduct provides a function through which complaints about police use of stop and search can be investigated. It is also able to issue recommendations to which forces are legally obliged to respond. As the “Inclusive Britain” report set out, the Government also recognise the importance of scrutiny by local communities. We are already enhancing these safeguards through the development of a national framework for community scrutiny of stop and search.

I know the hon. Lady will join me in praising the hard work of those two independent bodies in scrutinising police powers, and indeed the hard work of the police in using stop and search over the past couple of years to remove about 50,000 knives from the streets. I hope I have offered her some reassurance that we are conscious of our duty to deal with disproportionality, and that the existing safeguards and structures, as well as the new powers in the Bill, will be aligned with respect to that responsibility. On that basis, I hope she will withdraw the new clause.

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[Sarah Jones]

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

New clauses 10, 11 and 12 are in similar vein, and are about checks and balances to go alongside the legislation about which we have significant concerns. New clause 10 would mandate the Secretary of State to issue guidance to police forces on the protest technique of locking on, including the sharing of best practice and detailed guidance on addressing and developing forms of locking on.

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[Kit Malthouse]

The new clause introduces a requirement on the Home Secretary to issue statutory guidance to the police on responding to lock-ons. While we agree that the Government should guide the police in the exercise of their powers, the police already have specialist teams trained to remove protesters from lock-ons. These teams continually develop their knowledge and training to keep pace with innovations in locking on, and I believe that the police themselves are best placed to develop guidance on the matter. Given that, I ask the hon. Lady to withdraw the new clause.

[Sarah Jones]

I thank the Minister for his comments. We suggest that the College of Policing and the National Police Chiefs’ Council would develop the detail—we do not suggest that us legislators would do that—but I am happy to withdraw the new clause because he has said that there will be significant guidance. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 11

Consolidated protest guidance

“(1) Within three months of Royal Assent to this Act, the Secretary of State must by regulations issue guidance which consolidates into a single source—

(a) the College of Policing’s authorised professional practice for public order guidance,

(b) the National Police Chiefs’ Council’s operational advice for protest policing, and

(c) the National Police Chiefs’ Council’s protest aide memoire.

(2) The Secretary of State must regularly review the guidance and, if appropriate, must by regulations issue revised consolidated guidance.

(3) The consolidated guidance must include specific updated guidance about the protest technique of locking on.”—(Sarah Jones.)

Brought up, and read the First time.

[Sarah Jones]

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

The new clause makes provision for consolidated protest guidance, bringing together the College of Policing’s public order authorised professional practice, the NPCC’s operational advice for protest policing and the NPCC’s protest aide-mémoire. The guidance must also include specific updated guidance about the protest technique of locking on. Similarly to the previous new clause, new clause 11 would help the police—in what we think is a broadly-defined piece of legislation—gather the guidance and equip themselves with the statistics necessary to do their job to the best of their ability. If the evidence sessions pointed to anything, it was that at the top of the police, there are good practices of introspection. They talk about and share good practice and want to scrutinise what is done well and what is done badly. The new clause merely puts that in law.

On training, Matt Parr believed that more could be done—although he was complimentary in some areas. The Minister talked about the specialist forces. He highlighted that that was patchy. When it comes to provisions on the policing of protests in this legislation, the NPCC remains concerned about some aspects of the document’s commentary, which it felt were open to misinterpretation. For that reason, we think it would be better to have that clarity in the law, which the new clause seeks to do.

[Kit Malthouse]

Although I recognise the hon. Lady’s intent on the issue, I struggle to see the benefit of the new clause. Protest guidance is the responsibility of the police and the College of Policing. She referred to a recommendation from Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary and fire and rescue services on the policing of protests. The College of Policing is responsible for setting standards, providing training and sharing good practice for police forces. It is best placed to implement the recommendation. In fact, the college has already acted on it, and an updated public order authorised professional practice can be found on its website. The APP has consolidated guidance and links to other relevant guidance. I understand that it will be continually reviewed and updated.

Given that the effect of the new clause is already in place, we will not be supporting it. The inspectorate has sensibly recommended that the updating and management of national protest guidance is done by the College of Policing. It is the body with the knowledge and expertise to provide guidance to police forces. We do not see what benefit placing that obligation on the Government would bring, so I ask her to withdraw the new clause.

[Sarah Jones]

Although we will not press the new clause to a vote, I hope that I have put on the record the Labour party’s concern and our expectation that the Minister will come back to discuss with us the guidance that will be issued to ensure that the Bill is implemented as effectively as possible. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 12

National monitoring tool

“(1) The Secretary of State must develop a consistent national monitoring tool, accessible by all police forces, to monitor the use of or requests for specialist protest officers across England and Wales.

(2) Data collected under this section may be used to evaluate capacity and demand for specialist protest officers across England and Wales.

(3) The monitoring tool must be accessible on a national, regional and local basis.

(4) The monitoring tool must include—

(a) examples of best practice from policing protests across the United Kingdom, and

(b) data on how many trained officers have been required for any protests during the period in which monitoring took place.”—(Sarah Jones.)

Brought up, and read the First time.

[Sarah Jones]

I beg to move, That the Clause be read a Second time.

The new clause would require the Secretary of State to develop a consistent monitoring tool that is accessible by all police forces to monitor the use of, or requests for, specialist protest officers across England and Wales. Data that is collected may be used to evaluate capacity and demand for specialist officers. The tool, which must be accessible nationally, regionally and locally, could include examples of best practice from policing protests and data on how many trained officers have been required for any protest during the monitoring period.

I will not go into more detail than that, as the new clause speaks to arguments that we have already made for new clauses 10 and 11.

[Kit Malthouse]

In effect, the new clause brings back a clause that was initially tabled to the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act in January 2022 on Report. As the hon. Lady said, it would require the creation of a monitoring tool.

As the Government stated in the House of Lords in January, such a tool is not necessary. The National Police Co-ordination Centre, which is known as NPoCC and is part of the National Police Chiefs’ Council, already co-ordinates and monitors the use of and requests for protest removal-trained officers across the UK. Furthermore, following recommendations by the inspectorate, the police’s national public order and public safety lead is already working on an evaluation of the requirement for specialist protest officers.

On the sharing of best practice, the College of Policing has, as I have said, updated the existing authorised professional practice on public order and public safety policing. That resource is easily accessible to all forces and will help them to understand best practice when policing protests. On the basis that this House should legislate only when it is strictly necessary, and that such work is already under way, I ask the hon. Lady to withdraw the motion.

[Sarah Jones]

It is slightly alarming that the Minister fails to understand the concept of checks and balances to ensure that such a serious and significant piece of legislation is properly implemented, but I will not divide the Committee. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 13

Injunction to prevent serious disruption to effective movement of essential goods or services

“(1) Upon an application by a person under subsection (4), an injunction may be ordered by a Judge of the High Court against ‘persons unknown’ in order to prevent a serious disruption to the effective movement of any essential goods or any essential services occasioned by a public procession or public assembly.

(2) The ‘persons unknown’ may be—

(a) anonymous persons taking part in a public procession or public assembly who are identifiable at the time of the proceedings; and/or

(b) persons not presently taking part in a public procession or public assembly protest but who will in future join such a public procession or public assembly.

(3) The conditions under which such an injunction may be granted are as follows—

(a) there must be a real and imminent risk of a tort being committed which would result in a serious disruption to the effective movement of any essential goods or any essential services;

(b) a method of service must be set out in the order which may reasonably be expected to bring the proceedings to the attention of the ‘persons unknown’;

(c) the ‘persons unknown’ must be defined in the order by reference to their conduct which is alleged to be unlawful;

(d) the acts prohibited by the order must correspond with the threatened tort;

(e) the order may only prohibit lawful conduct if there is no other proportionate means of protecting the effective movement of essential goods or essential services;

(f) the terms of the order must set out what act or acts the persons potentially affected by the order must not do;

(g) the terms of the order must set out a defined geographical area to which the order relates; and

(h) the terms of the order must set out a temporal period to which the order relates, following which the order will lapse unless a further order is made upon a further application by the applicant.

(4) An applicant for an injunction to prevent serious disruption to effective movement of essential goods or services may be—

(a) a local authority with responsibility for all or part of the geographical area to which the proposed order relates;

(b) a chief constable with responsibility for all or part of the geographical area to which the proposed order relates; or

(c) a person resident in, or carrying on a business within, the geographical area to which the proposed order relates.

(5) ‘Serious disruption to effective movement of essential goods or services’ includes a prolonged disruption to—

(a) the effective movement of the supply of money, food, water, energy or fuel;

(b) a system of communication;

(c) access to a place of worship;

(d) access to a transport facility;

(e) access to an educational institution; or

(f) access to a service relating to health.”—(Sarah Jones.)

Brought up, and read the First time.

[Sarah Jones]

I beg to move, That the Clause be read a Second time.

The clause makes specific provision for an injunction to prevent serious disruption to the effective movement of essential goods or services, and sets out the circumstances in which an injunction may be granted against “persons unknown”. Those circumstances are based on the principles set out in paragraph 82 of the Court of Appeal’s 2020 decision in Canada Goose UK v. Persons Unknown. The clause also sets out the parties that may apply for such an injunction. They are:

“a local authority with responsibility for all or part of the geographical area to which the proposed order relates; a chief constable with responsibility for all or part of the geographical area to which the proposed order relates; or a person resident in, or carrying on a business within, the geographical area to which the proposed order relates.”

The new clause uses the definition of “serious disruption” that was introduced in the House of Lords during the later stages of the passage of the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022. I put on the record again my disagreement with the definitions of serious disruption— which include “noise”—in subsections 12(2C) and (2E) of the Public Order Act 1986, which section 73 of the 2022 Act inserted. We have had significant debates on that issue, and I will not rehearse them again, but I will quote the right hon. Member for Hereford and South Herefordshire (Jesse Norman), who said in a letter to the Prime Minister:

“No genuinely Conservative government should have supported the recent ban on noisy protest—least of all when basic human freedoms are facing the threat of extinction in Ukraine.”

Although the definition of “serious disruption” is not perfect, the Opposition welcome the fact that a definition has been put in the Bill to replace the original provision, which would have left the Secretary of State to decide what serious disruption means. It is right that this definition remains subject to a power to amend these provisions. As the right hon. Member for Maidenhead said:

“It is tempting when Home Secretary to think that giving powers to the Home Secretary is very reasonable, because we all think we are reasonable, but future Home Secretaries may not be so reasonable.”—[Official Report, 15 March 2021; Vol. 691, c. 78.]

New clause 13 focuses on the definition in proposed new subsection (2A)(b) to section 12 of the 1986 Act, as inserted by the 2022 Act. It puts into statute the case law principles from the Canada Goose case, which allowed injunctions to be taken out against “persons unknown”, so these ideas are not new. The new clause puts into statute what already exists in case law, so if the Government oppose it, they are opposing existing case law decided by the judiciary.

The new clause allows local authorities, affected residents or business owners and chief constables to work together to prevent the kinds of serious disruption we have seen in the Just Stop Oil protests, protests against HS2 and in actions by Insulate Britain. The definition of “persons unknown” includes

“persons…who will in future join such a public procession or public assembly”,

So this new clause is putting into statute a law that already exists.

It is not necessary, as we have argued throughout the Bill Committee debates, to bring in unnecessary and complex new offences when there is a raft of existing laws that the police, local authorities and businesses can use to deal with protest that disrupts essential goods and services.

Subsection (3) sets out

“the conditions under which such an injunction may be granted”,

and it is clear that

“the acts prohibited by the order must correspond with the threatened tort”.

That word was new to me but I now understand what it means, although I will not go into it now. Also, there

“must be a real and imminent risk of a tort being committed which would result in a serious disruption to the effective movement of any essential goods or any essential services”.

Police officers have told us that some of the most effective measures they use in the face of potentially serious disruption are injunctions. The NPCC protest lead, Chris Noble, said:

“The feedback we have had is that when they are appropriately framed and developed at an appropriate pace, they can be very useful in terms of what we are trying to control and how we are trying to shape people’s behaviour... Injunctions have been used increasingly frequently, but the challenge is framing them appropriately and securing them within a reasonable timescale so they can have maximum impact.”––[Official Report, Public Order Public Bill Committee, 9 June 2022; c. 8, Q7.]

How long it can take public and private authorities to get injunctions in place is a problem, and we acknowledge that they are costly, but the cost of responding to seriously disruptive protest must fall somewhere and there is a conversation to be had about that balance.

Nicola Bell, regional director of Highways England, said that

“once people saw that injunctions were being followed through, committal proceedings were happening and people were going to prison, that did have a deterrent effect”.––[Official Report, Public Order Public Bill Committee, 9 June 2022; c. 28, Q57.]

HS2 said that

“injunctions do serve as a relatively effective deterrent to unlawful…activity by some groups of protestors”.

The courts take them seriously, the judicial oversight ensures that the powers are not misused and they can have faster enforcement processes than for individual offences.

HS2’s written evidence, talking about its route-wide civil injunction, said:

“Whilst, if granted, it is hoped that the route-wide injunction will significantly reduce disruption to the project caused by trespass and obstruction of access, it is unlikely to eliminate the problem.”

The police tell us they are frustrated by private companies and public authorities not acting fast enough to seek injunctions, and therefore leaving the responsibility to tackle disruption to the police, instead of taking on the responsibility themselves.

If people are in trouble, it is fairer that they have their eyes open to that possibility beforehand. For similar reasons, a clear injunction about what specific actions a person may not take is likely to be a better deterrent than criminal offences which are vaguer than a specific injunction.

I want to leave sufficient time for the Minister to make his points, but an injunction warns a person beforehand what they must not do. If they breach the injunction, they do so in the knowledge that it could lead to proceedings against them, so it is fairer. For similar reasons, a clear injunction about what specific actions a person may not take is likely to be a better deterrent than criminal offences, which are vaguer than a specific injunction.

It may also be easier to prove a breach of an injunction than to make good a criminal charge, so it may also be a more efficient way to enforce protection of vital infrastructure. We think this is a route that exists already and is there in case law, and so we have put it on the face of the Bill.

[Kit Malthouse]

As the hon. Lady said, new clause 13 looks to create a framework that allows local authorities, chief constables, residents, and business owners in an area to apply for an injunction to prevent serious disruption to the effective movement of essential goods or services. She quite neatly illustrates the problem with prescriptive definitions, but has created a new one with the notion of “prolonged”. I am not sure how long she thinks prolonged should be. Nevertheless, these are naturally definitions that we have in the past left to the courts.

We agree with the hon. Lady that injunctions have an important part to play in the response to the criminal protests, as we have seen this past year. However, we are not clear what she is trying to achieve with the amendment. As we have seen with Insulate Britain and Just Stop Oil protests, injunctions can already be taken out by businesses and local authorities to prevent protesters from causing serious disruption to the effective movement of essential goods or services. Unlike the proposed new clause, the wider measures already in the Bill change the status quo, providing greater protection against the guerrilla activism that we have seen from recent protest groups.

We recognise the need to ensure better co-ordination of injunctions. However, the new clause does not address this challenge. We have heard the calls from the Opposition on this, and the Government are exploring what more can be done at a national level to protect key infrastructure and prevent disruption to the flow of essential goods and services. The clause as it stands does not deliver meaningful change. It creates a definitional problem of its own. Given that, I urge the hon. Lady to withdraw her amendment.

[Sarah Jones]

I am grateful to the Minister for saying that he is exploring what more can be done and for accepting that injunctions have a role to play. I suspect that members of the other place may want to return to this at another stage, so I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

Title

Amendment made: 24, in title, line 2, leave out “delegation” and insert “exercise”. —(Kit Malthouse.)

This amendment is consequential on NC4.

Bill, as amended, to be reported.