House of Lords

Monday 9th March 2026 Lords Chamber

Monday 9 March 2026

14:30

Prayers—read by the Lord Bishop of Norwich.

Retirements of Members

Monday 9th March 2026 Lords Chamber

Announcement

14:37

[The Lord Speaker (Lord Forsyth of Drumlean)]

My Lords, I should like to notify the House of the retirement, with effect from today, of the noble Lord, Lord Suri, pursuant to Section 1 of the House of Lords Reform Act 2014. On behalf of the House, I should like to thank the noble Lord for his much-valued service to the House.

I must also notify the House of the retirement, with effect from Saturday 7 March, of the noble Lord, Lord Chadlington, pursuant to Section 1 of the House of Lords Reform Act 2014. I should like to recognise the noble Lord’s long service to the House.

Stamp Duty: Periodic Tenancies

Monday 9th March 2026 Lords Chamber

Question

14:37

Asked by

[Lord Bailey of Paddington]

To ask His Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of whether periodic tenancies draw more tenants into Stamp Duty Land Tax lease returns than fixed-term tenancies; and what legislative or other steps they intend to take as a result.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (Baroness Taylor of Stevenage) (Lab)]

My Lords, the Government are aware that the Renters’ Rights Act 2025, which abolishes fixed-term tenancies, may in some very rare circumstances bring more tenancies into the stamp duty land tax regime. We are working closely with His Majesty’s Treasury and HMRC to ensure that no tenant is brought into paying stamp duty on the rent they pay as a result of the Renters’ Rights Act, and we will update Parliament shortly.

[Lord Bailey of Paddington (Con)]

I thank the Minister for her Answer. Will any guidance be issued by HMRC or anybody else to tenants, landlords and agents to let them know whether their tenancy will come under stamp duty land tax and they have to issue some kind of return to HMRC? Many tenants are very worried that this will happen to them, and lots of agents have no idea that this is coming.

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

I want to reassure tenants and landlords that very few tenants will be affected by this in the first year. A tenancy must have extremely high rents or have been running for a very long time under the previous system to even approach the stamp duty threshold in the first year. HMRC’s assessment is that this will be a very small number of cases. We intend to ensure that even in those rare instances, tenants do not face a stamp duty land tax charge as a result of these reforms. We will work with HMRC to make sure that clear and accessible guidance is available for both tenants and landlords.

[Lord John of Southwark (Lab)]

My Lords, one of the ways in which we meet the concerns that the noble Lord has raised is by increasing the housing supply. Can my noble friend the Minister give us an update on the social and affordable housing programme that the Government are supporting?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

I am very pleased to give the House an update on the social and affordable housing programme. We have now published its prospectus, and the Government have put in £39 billion of funding to kick-start social and affordable housebuilding at scale across the country. The core objective of that new programme will be to maximise supply, with a target to deliver at least 60% of the homes under the programme at social rent. That will be around 300,000 social and affordable homes over the programme’s lifetime. We published the guidance in November 2025, and we are now calling on all registered providers to review the details confirmed and to prepare large and ambitious proposals. We want to see the social landlord sector really embrace this. The bidding process opened in February, and we look forward to receiving some good bids.

[Baroness Thornhill (LD)]

My Lords, the Renters’ Rights Act places the full weight of delivery and its success on two public bodies—the courts to provide timely justice and local authorities to provide enforcement. Can the Minister please reassure the House that on 1 May, when these additional rights are switched on, both the courts and councils will have sufficient capacity and resources to deal with this additional workload, given that, at the moment, court delays are still long and council enforcement capacity varies according to your postcode?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

We had much discussion about this during the passage of the Act, and we are working very closely with colleagues in the Ministry of Justice to implement the reforms. Work is progressing well to ensure that the courts and tribunals have the resources and capacity they need to handle the additional workload that the reforms may generate. Work is also progressing on the new digital end-to-end service for resolving all possession claims in the county courts in England and Wales. Ultimately, the Act should reduce demand on the county courts, because possession claims will be able to be brought only where there is a valid reason for the landlord to do so.

The noble Baroness is quite right about local authorities. We are helping councils to build their enforcement capacity and get ready for implementation. We have provided new burdens funding, and we have funded the Operation Jigsaw network of local councils to deliver bespoke training on the Act.

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, during the passage of the Renters’ Rights Act, many noble Lords across the House raised concerns about its impact on the private rental market—with landlords leaving the market, seeking to raise rents and using Section 21 before the implementation of the Act, which does little to stop rogue landlords. Does the Minister consider the reports of Labour donor Asif Aziz’s company Criterion Capital issuing large numbers of Section 21 eviction notices, if true, a rational response to the Act or the action of a rogue landlord?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

As the noble Lord will know, the basis of the Renters’ Rights Act was made under the previous Government. We wanted to make sure that we tackle the issues in the housing market and have done so with a very effective piece of legislation. On mass evictions, the latest Ministry of Justice landlord possession action statistics published in February showed a 17% reduction in county court Section 21 landlord-accelerated possession claims in quarter 4 compared with the same quarter in 2024. We have given a strong message that responsible landlords have nothing to fear from the reforms; they will have access to a wide range of possession grounds where they are needed.

[The Earl of Effingham (Con)]

My Lords, the Government told us last year that there would be a consultation on creating a new ISA product to support first home buyers in early 2026. Can the Minister confirm the timeline of that consultation and clarify whether there will be any changes to the existing lifetime ISA, which is helping first-time buyers significantly?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

I am currently working across the sector on a wide range of support to provide the framework that first-time buyers will need in order to take the practical steps to access the market and to build up confidence. That work is going very well. First-time buyers benefit from paying no stamp duty up to £300,000 and can claim relief on purchases up to £500,000. Further steps will be announced in due course.

Crown Estate: Wales

Monday 9th March 2026 Lords Chamber

Question

14:44

Asked by

[Baroness Humphreys]

To ask His Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the impact of the activities of the Crown Estate on (1) the Welsh economy, and (2) household budgets in Wales.

[Lord in Waiting/Government Whip (Lord Wilson of Sedgefield) (Lab)]

The recently passed Crown Estate Act ensured that the Crown Estate can continue working in the best interests of Wales and the wider United Kingdom. The Crown Estate is key to the £1.4 billion of economic growth and more than 5,000 jobs that the Government want to secure from floating offshore wind in the Celtic Sea. It works closely with the Welsh Government to ensure that the offshore potential of this emerging sector benefits Welsh communities onshore.

[Baroness Humphreys (LD)]

I thank the Minister for that reply. However, the Crown Estate has removed the cap for offshore wind leases and is running uncapped auctions that force wind farm developers to pay extremely high fees simply to access the seabed. Can the Minister confirm that the fourth offshore wind leasing round generated more profit for the Crown Estate than all the previous rounds combined and that this system has inflated the cost of building offshore wind farms, with a consequent increase in electricity prices for household budgets in Wales? Is it not time for political oversight of the activities of the Crown Estate in Wales?

[Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)]

I thank the noble Baroness for that question, but on the point about oversight, a Crown Estate commissioner with special responsibility for Wales will be appointed in due course. As far as offshore wind is concerned, for Wales a priority is to deliver certainty. Retaining the current model avoids fragmenting a cross-border Celtic Sea market and preserves investor confidence at a sensitive point for floating offshore wind. Further devolution would risk fragmenting the energy market, undermining international investor confidence and disrupting activity elsewhere in the Crown Estate.

[Lord Wigley (PC)]

Is the Minister not aware of the reply given by a Minister in the other place to the MP for Anglesey, Llinos Medi, when the Government confirmed that they had no assessment of how many jobs would come to Wales from the new offshore wind projects in the Celtic Sea and the Irish Sea? Is the Minister aware of the very real concern in Wales that these projects will be bypassing Wales’s supply chains, losing economic potential? Is it not necessary for power and authority over the Crown Estate to be transferred to the Welsh Government so that they get the priority that they deserve?

[Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)]

Offshore will create up to 5,000 jobs—on top of the 3,000 jobs that will be created by the building of small modular reactors on Anglesey. It will provide energy for 1.5 million households. We are aiming in the right direction. As far as the supply chain is concerned, we will be investing £50 million for a supply chain accelerator and up to £350 million for enabling port and supply chain infrastructure to come forward.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

Have His Majesty’s Government asked the Crown Estate exactly how it helps to deliver their promise for a more environmentally conscious and greener Wales when it carries on handing out licences to marine aggregate dredgers to dredge in marine protected areas off Wales? Dirty seas deter tourists.

[Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)]

We have a very good relationship with the Crown Estate and work very closely with the Welsh Government. We will be appointing a commissioner to the Crown Estate to ensure that we have someone there who is prepared to look consciously at all the issues that affect Wales. We want to see a Welsh economy that is growing. One way of doing that is through investing in green industries, which I would have thought the noble Baroness would welcome.

[Baroness Kramer (LD)]

My Lords, to pick up the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, is the Minister aware that people in Wales are convinced, following conversations with the Crown Estate, that the overwhelming majority of new skilled jobs created by offshore in the Celtic Sea will go to outsiders, not to people in Wales, and that the supply chain will use a few Welsh companies but primarily suppliers from outside Wales? Therefore, can he talk to us about what the Government are doing to build the supply chain and the skills in Wales and to make sure that Welsh companies have a definite percentage of the new business and opportunities that are on offer?

[Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)]

The Crown Estate and the Government are particularly concerned about ensuring that we have investment in local supply chains, and we are going along with that in whatever we are doing. For example, as I have said, this £50 million is going to be invested in the supply chain accelerator. We are going to ensure that some of the money that will be generated from offshore wind goes into local communities. We are well aware of the issues, but we need to focus on the fact that we are heading in the right direction as far as green energy development is concerned.

[Lord Swire (Con)]

My Lords, when the Crown Estate had this windfall from its offshore wind bonanza, it was reputed to have said that it wanted a lot of the money to go towards good causes. Given that this will mean an explosion of overhead power lines in Wales and elsewhere in the United Kingdom, what discussions have the Government had with the Crown Estate about spending some of that bonanza on, where possible, burying these power lines?

[Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)]

The Government’s approach to burying these cables underground is well known, really, because, essentially, where we can do it, we will, in order to protect the local area. It is cheaper to put them overhead, but even if you bury them, there is still a lot of disruption to the local area with the kind of access you need to the cables themselves. It is not actually the answer to all our concerns. We know that we need to think about how we develop these pylons and whether we should lay the cables under the ground, but to do that is not the answer in all cases.

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)]

My Lords, does my noble friend agree that the events in the Middle East and the renewed shock to oil and gas prices show why we should be self-sufficient, which is why we should enormously welcome the development of offshore wind off the coast of Wales?

[Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)]

My noble friend is absolutely right that we need to think about energy security. One thing that is coming out of what is happening, tragically, in the Middle East at the moment is that, because oil and gas prices are set internationally, this impacts on every country’s economy. That is why we need to invest in the green economy, in nuclear, in wind turbines and in solar—so that we become independent. When issues such as this happen and when there are shocks to the international energy markets, we do our best to ensure that we are insulated from them.

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)]

My Lords, in my ministerial experience, the Crown Estate arrangements, in fact, worked pretty well. The Minister will be glad to hear that. But the more important question for the Minister today is: would Welsh households not have been helped by lower bills if Labour had not gone down the dangerous road of banning North Sea oil and gas? That looks even more irresponsible, with oil prices spiking because of the war in the Middle East.

[Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)]

Just to repeat my response to the previous question, we have to make sure that we are independent of these problems that we are facing. Rather than relying on fossil fuel, the prices of which are set internationally, we need to have home-grown green energy to ensure that we can resist these problems. I just want to point out one or two things about how we are helping people in Wales. We are cutting household energy bills, saving the average household £150. We have helped over 160,000 people with the minimum wage. We have increased pensions by 4.8%, and we have increased benefits for people out of work by 3.8%. The 700,000 pensioners in Wales are going to be better off because of this Government.

[Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)]

My Lords, when we had the misfortune of leaving the European Union, Wales lost a significant amount of money from its structural programmes. The then Government promised that that shortfall would be more than made up for; indeed, the phrase was “not a penny less”. We have been promised that that gap will be bridged from the prosperity fund, but the Welsh Government remain rather sceptical about that. Does the Minister recognise that there is a shortfall and are the Government prepared to do anything about it?

[Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)]

The best way to answer this question is to look at what we have actually done, with the spending review in 2025 and the spring forecast in 2026. The outcome of that points to additional funding, on top of the Barnett formula, et cetera, of something in the order of £1 billion to be invested in Wales. That is good for its economy and good for the people of Wales. If they want to see this continue, the best thing they can do is to vote Labour in May.

Independent Commission on Adult Social Care

Monday 9th March 2026 Lords Chamber

Question

14:55

Asked by

[Lord Young of Cookham]

To ask His Majesty’s Government what progress has been made by the Independent Commission on Adult Social Care.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health and Social Care (Baroness Merron) (Lab)]

My Lords, the independent commission is making strong progress, and its work is on track. Just last week, the noble Baroness, Lady Casey, set out early recommendations for the Government to consider and take forward. This was informed by the commission’s extensive work, which included engaging with people and their families and across political parties. Later this year, the noble Baroness, Lady Casey, will launch the national conversation and publish the phase 1 report.

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

I am grateful for that. Last week, the noble Baroness, Lady Casey, said that the adult social care system was held together by “sticking plasters and glue” and said on the “Today” programme that the system was “horrendous”. She is due to complete the first part of her review this year—basically, looking at getting better value from the existing system—but the second part, which will look at the long-overdue reform of the adult social care system, will not be completed until 2028. That will be too late for this Government to pass the necessary legislation, making this Parliament the fifth to have ducked this issue. The noble Baroness, Lady Casey, completed her review of grooming gangs in four and a half months. If asked, she could complete the second part of this review by September 2027, which would give us adequate time for this to be done in this Parliament. Will the Minister ask her to do just that?

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

I understand why the noble Lord pushes this point, and I am sure that we all share his view. It has also been said that there is not a lack of good ideas, but there has been a lack of good politics. That observation has been made. The noble Baroness, Lady Casey, is chairing an independent commission and she has made it clear how complex and deep-seated these challenges are, as the noble Lord described. The 2028 date is a “by” date; the noble Baroness may report sooner, but that is a matter for her.

[Baroness Pitkeathley (Lab)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Casey, concentrates on workforce issues. I am sure that she and my noble friend agree that patients, families and carers do not care who is employing the social care worker, as long as they are getting support. Should we concentrate on a flexible workforce that works across both agencies without boundaries to meet the changing needs of the population?

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

That is key in the mind of the noble Baroness, Lady Casey. We need to better join up the NHS and social care workforces. We will have a workforce plan for the NHS in spring this year and we are also investing in developing our social care workforce to professionalise and respect it.

[Baroness Barker (LD)]

My Lords, last summer, local authorities came under pressure from the Department of Health to make people and their families go through assessments for continuing healthcare. From the speech by the noble Baroness, Lady Casey, on 4 March, we now know that ICBs were at the same time employing private companies to make sure that their CHC payments went down. Will the Minister undertake to review all the applications for continuing healthcare to each ICB throughout this financial year and publish the results, showing how many were accepted, how many were accepted on appeal and how many families were sent on a runaround between the different agencies?

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

What the noble Baroness describes—people getting the runaround—is, of course, unacceptable, and we have discussed this a number of times. I would be pleased to take back her suggestion to the Minister for Care, Stephen Kinnock.

[Lord Laming (CB)]

My Lords, for what it is worth, I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Casey, on her initial findings, which illustrate all too well how serious the situation is. The problem will be made worse by things such as, as the Minister just reported, the NHS workforce plan that will be produced in the near future. That is welcome as far as it goes, but it illustrates the separation between NHS services and local authority services. The reality is that there are very few people using adult social care services who are not simultaneously looking to the health service for their continuous needs. Will we continue to do everything possible to bridge the gap between the two services?

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

Yes, indeed. We have three core foundations in place in our government objectives for adult social care, one of which is—to the point made by the noble Lord—strengthening the join-up between health services and social care services, because people need to experience more integrated, person-centred care. I am glad that the noble Lord welcomes the immediate actions, set out by the noble Baroness, Lady Casey, that the Government must take on adult safeguarding, dementia and motor neurone disease. We are not wasting any time in taking those recommendations forward.

[Lord Kamall (Con)]

My Lords, picking up on the points made by the noble Baroness, Lady Pitkeathley, and the noble Lords, Lord Young and Lord Laming, when we were in government, we published a White Paper on an integrated national health and care service, to be available for patients from birth to their later years. When the new Government were elected, as was their prerogative, the Secretary of State talked about creating a separate national care service, but we have heard little since. Can the Minister tell your Lordships’ House whether we will have to wait until the next stage of the Casey commission, in 2028, to get any further details at all, especially on how it will work in tandem with our healthcare system, or can we expect any clues or hints before then?

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

The noble Lord does not have to wait because, in addition to the work by the noble Baroness, Lady Casey, which, as I have said, is independent, she has set out immediate recommendations, which we are working on. We have already made commitments on the disabled facilities grant for housing, so that people can stay in their own homes. We have announced a £500 million investment in the first ever fair pay agreement, and we are uplifting social care allowances to support disabled people more than they ever have been. Those are just some examples, and I would be very happy to direct the noble Lord to other ways in which we are already taking action.

[The Lord Bishop of Norwich]

My Lords, in 2023, the Archbishops’ Commission on Reimagining Care encouraged a conversation not only between provider and recipient but with all those involved in care and support, to create rounded and fulfilled lives. That includes the voluntary sector, community groups and faith groups, which provide befriending and bereavement support and acts of worship in care homes. What plans does the Casey commission have to ensure that all parties participate in the national conversation mandated in its terms of reference?

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

As I said earlier, that will be a matter for the noble Baroness, Lady Casey. But I have every confidence that all the groups the right reverend Prelate referred to will be included, not least because the noble Baroness and the secretariat have already met, travelled widely and had many conversations, including with some 400 groups and individuals, focusing particularly on those with lived experience.

[Lord Sikka (Lab)]

My Lords, 83% of adult social care is controlled by private equity. Its business model includes high prices, profiteering, low wages, asset stripping and tax abuse. It has profit margins of between 20% and 40% from adult social care. When are the Government going to end profiteering in this sector and ensure that social care is provided by not-for-profit entities only?

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

Various sectors have their role to play, and that includes the private sector, the voluntary sector and the public sector. As I have mentioned, we are building a national care service. It will focus on a high quality of care, greater choice and control for individuals and joined-up neighbourhood services, exactly as noble Lords request.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

What can the Government do about bed blockers before the final report?

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

I assume that the noble and learned Baroness is referring to people who are staying in unsuitable settings, such as hospitals, for too long because an alternative is not available. We are looking at reforming the better care fund, which assists a greater joined-up approach, and we are bringing in neighbourhood services so that people can be cared for nearer home. We are also harnessing technology—I have witnessed many good examples of that—whereby people do not have to be in hospital but can be at home, and the money we are investing so that people can improve accessibility within their own homes will also assist people to get back home.

British Business Bank

Monday 9th March 2026 Lords Chamber

Question

15:06

Asked by

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch]

To ask His Majesty’s Government what criteria are used by the British Business Bank when investing in UK businesses.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Business and Trade and Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (Baroness Lloyd of Effra) (Lab)]

My Lords, the British Business Bank’s investments are aligned with its strategic mandate, which is agreed with the Government and sets the bank’s overall strategic direction. It includes four objectives, the first of which is to support our most promising businesses in the industrial strategy priority sectors to scale and stay here. The bank is operationally independent and is responsible for undertaking its own due diligence and making investment decisions independently of government.

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)]

I thank my noble friend for that. The additional funding that has been given to the British Business Bank is welcome, but will it be encouraged to take higher risk stakes in some of our more innovative companies? Can we be assured that it has the expertise to make those critical judgments?

[Baroness Lloyd of Effra (Lab)]

My noble friend is right to ask about mandate and risk appetite. This is the direction that the British Business Bank is taking, guided by its new strategic mandate. It is increasingly taking bigger bets to enable innovative British companies to scale and stay in the UK. The Government have provided a one-third uplift to the BBB’s financial capacity to help it to do so. It is able to leverage deep industry expertise across its investment activities, including both direct investments and investments made through funds.

[Lord Fox (LD)]

My lords, as has been alluded to, as well as operating on a commercial basis the British Business Bank is expected to fill structural gaps in the capital market. As the sponsor of the British Business Bank, how does the Minister see its role in scaling up the UK defence supply chain? How will the British Business Bank help us to deliver the defence industry that we absolutely need?

[Baroness Lloyd of Effra (Lab)]

The British Business Bank’s new strategic mandate explicitly talks about supporting businesses in the industrial strategy priority sectors, which, as noble Lords will know, includes defence. One of the things that we will be doing is looking at where the financing gap is, whether that is for R&D intensive or deep-tech companies, and at investing behind specialist fund managers or investment strategies that specifically support particular sectors. Using its mandate, and with the increased financial capacity, the British Business Bank will be able to support our defence industry supply chain here in the UK.

[Baroness Rawlings (Con)]

My Lords, what are HMG doing to help the UK businesses affected by the present Gulf war?

[Baroness Lloyd of Effra (Lab)]

As was said earlier, we are monitoring the situation very carefully. It is unclear at present what exactly the long-term impact on energy prices and energy security will be. We are carefully looking at that. In the meantime, we have taken measures, including through the British energy-intensive industries scheme, to support energy prices for the most intensive users here in the UK.

[Lord Londesborough (CB)]

My Lords, the development bank has some eye-catching five-year targets, including funding the creation of 370,000 new jobs and crowding in some £26 billion of additional private capital. I welcome that ambition, but, for perspective, can the Minister say how the bank has performed over the last five years, particularly in the areas of job creation and gross value added?

[Baroness Lloyd of Effra (Lab)]

I may have to come back on those precise questions. The British Business Bank produces annual reports and has recently published an impact report which addresses some of the questions that the noble Lord specifically asks around job creation. That is an important aspect of its accountability for the funding it gets.

[Baroness Caine of Kentish Town (Lab)]

My Lords, the creative industries is a priority sector for the modern industrial strategy but not for the National Wealth Fund, as business structures seem to be better fitted to investment from the British Business Bank. Can my noble friend provide reassurance that the bank has the expertise and criteria that fit businesses such as those in the creative industries whose value lies in intellectual property, particularly while its protection is currently uncertain? In due course, can she share the comparative levels of investment made in the last two years in the key growth sectors?

[Baroness Lloyd of Effra (Lab)]

My noble friend is right to mention consistency with the industrial strategy. It was only in October last year that the Government gave the British Business Bank a new mandate, including to align with the industrial strategy’s priority sectors and making available £4 billion to support those areas. In setting out the priority sectors, the Government have outlined ways in which they expect the British Business Bank to meet that—for example, using specialist fund managers or tailored approaches for the specific financing and other requirements of those subsectors. Creative UK has committed to providing a single gateway to help those creative industries that need access to finance to navigate between the various sources of finance available from the Government.

[Lord Ranger of Northwood (Con)]

My Lords, I am a member of the Science and Technology Select Committee. We recently produced a report, Bleeding to Death, which I hope the Minister has seen, looking at the scale-up ecosystem of the UK and particularly the role of the British Business Bank. It concluded that we are in a doom loop. We do not have the scale or competitiveness, despite the extra investment in the British Business Bank. One of our recommendations was to bring different funds together, such as Innovate Finance, the National Wealth Fund and the British Business Bank. Have the Government looked at that recommendation?

[Baroness Lloyd of Effra (Lab)]

As I said, we are helping businesses navigate the way—for example, through the business growth service, which enables businesses to access all the types of finance and support that they need, including UK export finance and other facilities with the Government. For the creative industries, Creative UK has committed to taking that role to help those businesses navigate the way through. On supporting businesses and the VC ecosystem, there is a lot of activity with the new investor pathways programme to provide £400 million of cornerstone investments into VC funds.

[Lord Mair (CB)]

My Lords, to follow up on the question from the noble Lord, Lord Ranger, I have the privilege of chairing the House of Lords Select Committee on Science and Technology, and we published a report recently on the financing and scaling of UK science and technology companies. To achieve real economic growth, our report recommended that the British Business Bank should work much more closely with the National Wealth Fund and Innovate UK, and that it should focus on priority sectors and companies in the direction set by the Government’s industrial strategy, which has already been referred to. It is good that the Minister has confirmed that that is the direction being taken. Is the British Business Bank actively implementing this in conjunction with the National Wealth Fund? Is it prioritising science and technology companies and the identified sectors of the industrial strategy?

[Baroness Lloyd of Effra (Lab)]

The Government’s statement of strategic priorities had as its first objective to support our most promising businesses in the industrial strategy priority sectors, and the digital and technologies sector is among the industrial sectors identified. When the next annual report comes out in a year, we will be able to tell exactly how successful that has been. However, we have seen, in the light of some of the direct investments made, that the British Business Bank has taken seriously the mandate to invest directly and is pursuing that pathway.

[Lord Hunt of Wirral (Con)]

My Lords, does the Minister agree with me how grateful we are to the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, for introducing the subject of the British Business Bank, particularly at such a key time? Does she agree that, rather than setting demographic targets for investment, we and the British Business Bank should be focusing on backing the most investable opportunities in order to maximise productivity growth and returns for the taxpayer?

[Baroness Lloyd of Effra (Lab)]

I could not agree more with the noble Lord’s first point: my noble friend has given us a good opportunity to talk about this important institution. The new mission set by the British Business Bank is to drive economic growth by helping smaller businesses to get the finance they need to start, scale and stay in the UK. That is how we will grow a more productive economy here in the United Kingdom.

Iran and the Middle East

Monday 9th March 2026 Lords Chamber

Private Notice Question

15:17

Asked by

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon]

To ask His Majesty’s Government, following the deployment of UK naval and air assets to the Middle East and the appointment of Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei as the Supreme Leader of Iran, what assessment they have made of the conflict in the region and the status of the UK’s security and diplomatic relationship with the United States.

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)]

My Lords, I beg to ask a Question of which I have given private notice, and I draw attention to my entry on the register of interests as an adviser to the Arab Ambassadors Council.

[The Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (Baroness Chapman of Darlington) (Lab)]

My Lords, we condemn Iran’s strikes on its neighbours. They are unacceptable and threaten regional stability. Keeping people safe and defending national security is the Government’s first duty, and we continually assess potential threats to the United Kingdom. We continue to have discussions at every level with the US and others. American planes operating out of British bases and British jets shooting down drones and missiles to protect American lives is the special relationship in action. The appointment of Mojtaba Khamenei as the new Supreme Leader suggests no change in direction from Iran.

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)]

My Lords, at a time when our Gulf partners are asking for de-escalation and diplomacy, and indeed the United States President has said that he does not require the UK’s intervention, we seem to be intervening and escalating. The Minister delved on the issue of national security, but what is the stated objective of His Majesty’s Government when it comes to resolving this conflict specifically? The Minister referred to the use of UK bases; bearing in mind the Prime Minister’s stated objective that our intervention is defensive and that the US is carrying out a military intervention that is offensive, how does she square those two key strategic objectives?

[Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Lab)]

We want to see a swift conclusion to this conflict; that is in the interests of our Gulf partners, and they are very clear what they would like to see. We are involved in a defensive capacity, as the noble Lord says, because British lives and the lives of our allies and partners are at risk.

[Baroness Coussins (CB)]

My Lords, what assessment has been made of the impact of the conflict on BBC Persian staff based in London? What can His Majesty’s Government do to help their security and safety?

[Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Lab)]

Any threats to BBC Persian service staff in London or anywhere else—but certainly any threats in this country—are completely unacceptable, and our security services and the police work hard to keep them safe. One of the atrocious things about the Iranian regime is the way it has sought to act in the way it has against journalists and those wishing to report the truth about what is happening in Iran.

[Lord Fox (LD)]

My Lords, one of the consequences of the conflict has been President Trump seeming to clear India and other countries to break sanctions and buy Russian oil, which clearly changes the balance of the economy in the Ukraine war. Does the Minister agree that any political party, particularly His Majesty’s Opposition, which chooses unequivocally to support Donald Trump, is absolutely supporting this policy and letting Ukraine down?

[Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Lab)]

The noble Lord is right in that all these conflicts are interconnected in many subtle ways that often are not immediately obvious to those seeking to make political points in this country. It is obviously a matter for His Majesty’s Opposition to answer for their own conduct.

[Lord West of Spithead (Lab)]

My Lords, in 2003 the Prime Minister, Mr Blair, met the chiefs of staff just before the invasion of Iraq and we discussed our plan of action. At that meeting, we asked: what is the plan for phase 4? We were told by the Prime Minister that the Americans had phase 4 all in hand. As regards beating a country such as Iraq or Iran in conventional fighting, we can do that—we jolly well should be able to do that—but the difficult bit is the next bit. I ask my noble friend the Minister: have we actually asked the Americans what their plan is now and where we are actually going? This is the most dangerous part of any of these actions.

[Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Lab)]

I think we all remember the experience from 2003 and the decisions made around Iraq. Somebody who fought in Iraq—a Member of Parliament, Calvin Bailey, who was a wing commander in the RAF—said to me last week that there were two things that the British Government need to bear in mind before they take such a decision again: one is the legality and the other is what happens next. I think he is right. As a mother of boys of fighting age, I do not want to have to look into the eyes of anybody else’s mother and say that we had not done our work adequately ahead of making such a decision ever again.

[Baroness Goldie (Con)]

My Lords, sadly, it was universally acknowledged that this conflict was more likely to occur than less likely, with predictable consequences for British interests in the region. May I ask the Minister: why was our military response so tardy and so incomplete?

[Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Lab)]

I just do not accept that that is the case. We are just over a week into this conflict. Decisions were made rapidly at the outset. The initial request was declined—as is well recorded and well discussed—for reasons that have been explained, and I refer the noble Baroness to my answer to the previous question, which I hope explains why. The decision now is around defensive activity, and I think that that is the right position for the UK to take at this point.

[The Earl of Clancarty (CB)]

My Lords, obviously the first duty is the protection of citizens, but what steps are the Government taking to help protect cultural property in Iran and the wider region? Iran, Israel and the USA are all signatories to the 1954 Hague convention, but UNESCO world heritage sites have already been damaged, and many museums are at risk during this conflict.

[Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Lab)]

I am an archaeology graduate and I completely understand why the noble Earl asks that question. He is right to draw our attention to this. It is tragic that, alongside women and children, the cultural heritage in many conflict zones suffers. It becomes a target because adversaries understand just how fundamental many of these sites are to the identity of a particular population. So I thank the noble Earl for drawing attention to this.

[Lord Harper (Con)]

My Lords, can I press the Minister a little on her definition of “defensive operations”, given what the Deputy Prime Minister said at the weekend? Does “defensive operations” encompass using British weapons and bases proactively to take out Iranian missile-launching sites that could be used to target British military assets and British military personnel?

[Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Lab)]

I am sorry, but my noble friend the Minister for Defence was saying something while the noble Lord was speaking. I think he was trying to be helpful.

[The Minister of State, Ministry of Defence (Lord Coaker) (Lab)]

I was trying.

[Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Lab)]

He always tries to be helpful. Obviously, noble Lords would not expect me to comment in any detail on exactly what is being used, but we have F35s and Typhoons, which are being used to keep our citizens safe. We may have time for the noble Lord to ask the question again; if that was not quite what he was asking, I would be happy to answer him again.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, we are hearing from administrative figures in the United States, including the Secretary of War, that this is a crusade and that we are fighting a battle between Christianity and Islam. Can the British Government make it very clear that, to quote Tony Blair in his past days, we do not do God; that we think that any suggestion that this ought to be a battle between Christianity and Islam is horrifying and will lead to more than a regional war; that the aims have to be kept clear and limited; and that our support for the United States is also very limited?

[Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Lab)]

That is absolutely not the language that we are using. The actions that we are taking are defensive, as I have explained, and it is vital that we all take extreme care with the language we use around this conflict, not least because it can, and often does, find itself repeated and played out on the streets of the United Kingdom.

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

My Lords, can I probe the noble Baroness a little further on her answer to my noble friend Lord Harper? Initially, the UK denied the use of our bases for offensive strikes on Iran and then, 48 hours later, the Government permitted the use of the bases for defensive strikes. Can she explain the difference between striking Iran offensively and defensively please?

[Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Lab)]

There are vast books written about international law that the noble Lord may wish to consult. But, clearly, after Iran strikes civilian sites—hotels in Dubai where British nationals are staying, with their lives put at risk—then what we are doing to support the United States is clearly a defensive action.

[Lord Hannay of Chiswick (CB)]

My Lords, will the Minister agree that, for there to be any stability in the Gulf region and in the Middle East, there will have to be some kind of negotiated outcome on Iran’s nuclear activities, its missiles and its support for proxies? If that is so, what are the Government doing to discuss with the Chancellor of Germany and the President of France ideas that could be brought forward at some stage to achieve those objectives, other than by a collapse into chaos of Iran?

[Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Lab)]

Experience tells us that, at some point, this becomes an issue of dialogue and negotiation. Who is involved, the nature of it, how it is staged and where it takes place are, as of today, not known.

[Baroness Bousted (Lab)]

My Lords—

[Lord Austin of Dudley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords—

[Lord Polak (Con)]

My Lords—

[Baroness Hussein-Ece (LD)]

My Lords—

[Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms and Chief Whip (Lord Kennedy of Southwark) (Lab Co-op)]

My Lords, it is the turn of the Labour Benches, and then we will come to other noble Lords.

[Baroness Bousted (Lab)]

Could the Minister comment on the emerging evidence from BBC Verify that a US Tomahawk missile hit an Iranian primary school in Minab, where more than 168 people, mostly children, were killed? Are the Government liaising with the United States on this case and the issues that may arise from it?

[Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Lab)]

Of course, we are talking to our partners in the United States about this and very many other issues. We have all heard these reports and, of course, when situations such as this occur, any loss of civilian life is deeply regrettable, whether they be Israeli, Iranian or anybody else.

[Lord Austin of Dudley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, we might not have declared war on Iran, of course, but Iran has certainly declared war on the West and on us, not just threatening Israel, our closest ally in the region, but organising terror attacks here in the UK, kidnapping British citizens and threatening our citizens and bases in the Gulf. Of course, it would be better if these things could be resolved by negotiation, but what evidence can the Government point to of the Iranians being able to be trusted because they have stuck to any of the agreements that they have made in the past?

[Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Lab)]

I take that as a fair challenge. I am very well aware of the noble Lord’s views on this topic, and we have discussed them on many occasions—but the point that still stands as regards the United Kingdom’s position on this is that we must have clarity in international law, which we do for the actions that we are taking. However, we will also have to have a clear plan and a clear way forward.

[Lord Polak (Con)]

My Lords, the Minister talks about the safety of British citizens, and I would like to talk about the safety of British citizens in Britain. As the House knows, 20 terrorist attacks from the Iranians have been stopped here—thank God—and the 21st is probably not very far away. We have all called for the IRGC to be proscribed, but the Government continue to hide behind some sort of legal processes. It has been done everywhere across Europe, and we are still slow—so can we do this? While we are thinking about that, we have the al-Quds march taking place next Saturday, which will be a march in support of the new ayatollah and the regime that the Minister does not like. What are we going to do to stop that?

[Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Lab)]

I shall speak to my colleagues at the Home Office about the march. Obviously, how that is policed and what is done about it is rightly a matter for the relevant authorities. On the IRGC, I remind the House that we commissioned a legal report on this, and the recommendation was that the UK Government do not at present have the ability to sanction the IRGC in the way that we would want to, and we are committed to making the necessary changes to allow us to do just that.

[Lord Dubs (Lab)]

My Lords, what assessment have the Government made of the likelihood that the tensions in Lebanon and what is happening in Iran will lead to a flood of people seeking safety in Europe? Are we prepared for this, and are we having discussions with our European friends on how best to handle such a flood of people seeking safety?

[Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Lab)]

The noble Lord is right, and I am particularly worried about Lebanon and what is happening there. Yes, we are mindful of the impact that this can have on the movement of people—and yes, of course, we are talking to our partners and friends in the European Union about this.

Bereaved Partner’s Paternity Leave Regulations 2026

Monday 9th March 2026 Lords Chamber

Employment Rights Act 1996 (Application of Section 80B to Adoptions from Overseas) (Amendment) Regulations 2026

Employment Rights Act 1996 (Application of Section 80B to Parental Order Cases) (Amendment) Regulations 2026

Motions to Approve

15:34

Moved by

[Baroness Lloyd of Effra]

That the draft Regulations laid before the House on 13 January be approved. Considered in Grand Committee on 2 March.

Motions agreed.

Tobacco and Vapes Bill

Monday 9th March 2026 Lords Chamber

Third Reading

Scottish, Welsh and Northern Ireland legislative consent granted. Relevant document: 22nd Report from the Delegated Powers Committee.

15:35

Motion

Moved by

[Baroness Merron]

That the Bill be now read a third time.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health and Social Care (Baroness Merron) (Lab)]

My Lords, I will make a short statement on the position regarding legislative consent on this Bill. The Bill is UK-wide, and it has been developed in partnership with the Scottish Government, the Welsh Government and the Northern Ireland Executive. A legislative consent Motion was received from the Northern Ireland Assembly on 10 February 2025, from the Scottish Parliament on 29 May 2025 and the Senedd on 9 December 2025.

Following further amendments to the Bill on Report, supplementary legislative consent Motions have been sought from the Scottish Parliament and the Senedd. It has not been possible to complete this process before Third Reading. However, noting the strong support of the Scottish and Welsh Governments, we are hopeful that this process will conclude shortly. The Northern Ireland Executive has confirmed that their current legislative consent Motion is sufficient. I beg to move.

Schedule 16: Advertising etc: audiovisual and radio broadcasting

Amendment 1

Moved by

[Baroness Merron]

1: Schedule 16, page 169, line 39, leave out “(a) and (b),” and insert “—
(a) in paragraph (a),”Member’s explanatory statement
This makes a structural change to facilitate my amendment to Schedule 16, page 169, line 40.

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

My Lords, Amendments 1 to 5 are minor and technical, and stem from the amendments that the Government made on Report on advertising. The amendments ensure consistency across the advertising-related restrictions in the Communications Act 2003. In particular, they will ensure that a business which manufactures or sells more than one type of product, such as vaping products and nicotine products, is in scope of the restrictions on sponsorship of prohibited products. It was always the Government’s intention to capture any business which manufactures or sells prohibited products, no matter how many different types of product they sold or manufactured. The amendments therefore provide consistency across the advertising-related restrictions and prevent the creation of a potential loophole. I beg to move.

Amendment 1 agreed.

Amendments 2 to 5

Moved by

[Baroness Merron]

2: Schedule 16, page 169, line 40, at end insert—
“(b) in paragraph (b), after “other tobacco products” insert “, herbal smoking products or cigarette papers (or of two or more of those products)”.”Member’s explanatory statement
Section 368G(1)(b) of the Communications Act 2003, as amended, will refer to an undertaking whose principal activity is the manufacture etc of cigarettes or certain other products. The amendment spells out that this covers an undertaking whose principal activity is the manufacture etc of two or more of those products (for consistency with other amendments).

3: Schedule 16, page 169, line 41, leave out “(a) and (b),” and insert “—
(a) in paragraph (a),”Member’s explanatory statement
This makes a structural change to facilitate my amendment to Schedule 16, page 169, line 42.

4: Schedule 16, page 169, line 42, at end insert—
“(b) in paragraph (b), for “electronic cigarettes or electronic cigarette refill containers” substitute “vaping products or nicotine products (or both)”.”Member’s explanatory statement
Section 368G(1A)(b) of the Communications Act 2003, as amended, will refer to an undertaking whose principal activity is the manufacture etc of vaping or nicotine products. The amendment spells out that this covers an undertaking whose principal activity is the manufacture etc of both products (for consistency with other amendments).

5: Schedule 16, page 170, line 3, after “subsection (4)” insert “—
(a) in paragraph (b), after “tobacco products” insert “(or both)”;Member’s explanatory statement
Section 368H(4)(b) of the Communications Act 2003, as amended, will refer to an undertaking whose principal activity is the manufacture etc of cigarettes or other tobacco products. The amendment spells out that this covers an undertaking whose principal activity is the manufacture etc of both descriptions of product (for consistency with other amendments).

Amendments 2 to 5 agreed.

Bill read a third time.

15:39

Motion

Moved by

[Baroness Merron]

That the Bill do now pass.

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

My Lords, it has been a privilege to take this landmark Bill through your Lordships’ House. Smoking is the number one preventable cause of death, disability and ill health and tobacco claims around 80,000 lives every year. While tobacco remains the greatest threat, this legislation is about protecting future generations from the harms of not only tobacco but nicotine addiction.

I extend my thanks to noble Lords who have contributed from right across the House: in particular, on the Front Benches, the noble Lord, Lord Kamall, the noble Earls, Lord Howe and Lord Russell, and the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley. My thanks go also to the Secretary of State for his leadership and support and to former Minister Ashley Dalton MP, who advanced this Bill to your Lordships’ House.

I also want to pay tribute, as many of us do, to former Prime Minister the right honourable Rishi Sunak for his ambition for a smoke-free generation. I also thank the Chief Medical Officer, Sir Chris Whitty, for his expertise and unwavering focus, and all the officials who have played a crucial role, including the Bill team, policy teams, analysts, the Bill’s senior responsible owners, my private office and the Government Legal Department and the Office of the Parliamentary Counsel for their invaluable contributions.

Finally, I pay tribute to Ministers and officials from the devolved Governments for their collaborative approach. This is genuinely a four-nations Bill which will ensure that we create a smoke-free generation and tackle youth vaping in every corner of our country. I beg to move.

[Lord Kamall (Con)]

My Lords, we have now reached the conclusion of what many will see as a landmark Bill. I thank all noble Lords who have contributed throughout the various stages of its journey through your Lordships’ House, which began with its introduction as long ago as March last year. From these and other Benches, we heard a range of views on its various proposals and on the Bill itself. For some, it goes too far. For others, it does not go far enough. However, among all the disagreements, there were three points that I think noble Lords can agree on. First, smoking is bad for your health. Secondly, current evidence shows that vaping is less harmful than smoking tobacco. Thirdly, not vaping is healthier than vaping.

Beyond that, our debates covered a number of issues, from the evidence base to how to make vapes an attractive alternative to adults who wish to quit smoking while not appealing to children, as well as matters of individual liberty. We also debated the illicit sale of tobacco, the treatment of specialist retailers, cigarette filters, the compatibility of the Bill with the Windsor Framework and the enforcement of a regulatory regime of considerable complexity. We also probed the Government on the evidence behind some of the proposals, for example on the relative harm of heated tobacco compared with combustible tobacco for smokers who have tried vapes but did not like them, so reverted to cigarettes.

While we did not always agree, I thank the Minister and her officials for meeting my noble friend Lord Howe and me throughout the passage of the Bill. I particularly thank her for the concessions made: we particularly welcome the amendment permitting vape vending machines in secure mental health settings. These are vulnerable people in restricted environments for whom access to cessation aids is not a luxury but a genuine health need and it was right that the Bill was amended accordingly.

15:45

I also pay tribute to my noble friend Lord Lindsay and other noble Lords who have consistently and cogently made the case for specialist tobacconists throughout this process. These are small, responsible businesses serving adult consumers, some of whom travel specifically to London from all over the world to sample and purchase high-value hand-crafted cigars. These cigars are quite distinct and much less affordable than cigarillos and machine-made cigars that form part of the mass tobacco market this Bill principally targets. I hope the Government will continue to bear that distinction in mind as secondary legislation is developed.

It is on secondary legislation that I wish to sound a note of caution, because a very significant portion of the Bill’s practical effects will be determined not by what Parliament has already debated but by regulations yet to be laid. The rules governing vape descriptors, flavours, advertising restrictions and the designation of vape-free zones all remain to be settled by Ministers. That is a considerable degree of delegated power; it is power the Government have argued is necessary to allow them to collect the evidence. While we see that there may be merit in that argument, we on these Benches will monitor the development of the regulations carefully.

Our concerns, however, can be summarised relatively easily: we want regulations to be grounded in evidence; they must not impose unnecessary burdens on retailers, especially corner shops and other small retailers; and they must not impose burdens on the hospitality sector. The regulations must also recognise the concerns of former smokers who rely on vape products and descriptors as part of their pathway from smoking and, therefore, must not ban products that might make smoking cessation more difficult. We welcome the commitment to a review of this Act after a reasonable period of years. That review will matter.

The generational ban may, over time, contribute to reducing smoking rates, but the risk of unintended consequences is real. The illicit tobacco market, by some accounts, continues to grow, and a permanent, ever-widening prohibition on tobacco sales to an increasing share of the adult population may drive some to that market. We hope that any review will examine such questions honestly and not with a predetermined response whatever the evidence.

Finally, I thank my noble friend Lord Howe for his advice and his contributions to the debate. I also thank all those organisations, whatever their views, which shared their briefings with my noble friend and other noble Lords at every stage of the Bill’s progress. Of course, it is never possible to satisfy all points of view. I hope, however, they feel that we thoroughly debated the issues they raised. I also hope that, whatever one thinks of this Bill, these measures will help smokers who wish to quit; that they will reduce the attractiveness of taking up smoking, particularly among our youth; and that they will improve the health of our nation.

[Earl Russell (LD)]

My Lords, I speak for my Benches, as my noble friend Lady Walmsley is unable to be here today as she is presently chairing a committee. As we reach the final stage of this landmark public health legislation, I begin by expressing my sincere thanks to the Minister and her officials for their constructive engagement throughout. This has been challenging and complex legislation, and the collaborative spirit shown across the House in scrutinising it has undoubtedly strengthened it.

I want to thank my noble friend Lady Walmsley for her outstanding leadership of our team, her diligent negotiation and her clear focus on public health. I also thank my noble friend Lady Northover and the rest of the Bill team. I thank Adam Bull in our Whips’ Office for his guidance and support throughout.

From the very start, we have been proud to support this Bill and the principle underpinning it: the creation of a smoke-free generation. The generational ban is bold, evidence-based and one of the most significant steps any of us will probably take as parliamentarians to improve the nation’s health and well-being in our lifetimes. It will help ensure that future generations never start on the path to addiction and the devastating consequences that surely follow.

We are pleased that, through our discussions, a number of improvements have been secured. Local authorities will now retain the full proceeds from the £2,500 fixed penalty notices issued for licensing offences, giving trading standards the resources they need for effective enforcement. The Government have also taken new powers to regulate or ban cigarette filters, recognising growing concerns about the false perception of safety they create and their environmental impact.

To support smoking cessation, a new defence will allow public authorities to partner with businesses to promote non-branded vapes and nicotine products for public health purposes. The narrow exemption introduced for vape vending machines in adult mental health hospitals is also welcome, ensuring an appropriate balance between safeguarding and supporting cessation in secure settings.

We also welcome the Government’s acceptance of the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee’s recommendations to upgrade the parliamentary procedure for age-verification regulations to affirmative and the commitment to a formal statutory review within four to seven years of Royal Assent. The recently launched consultation on smoke-free, heated tobacco-free and vape-free places also sends an important signal about the Government’s intention to maintain momentum in this area. However, there is still more to do. We regret that the Government did not accept the cross-party proposals for a levy on big tobacco company profits to fund cessation and related healthcare, and we believe that further action is essential to keep vapes out of the hands of our children and bring forward a proper ban on disposable vapes.

This Bill lays the foundations for a generational shift in public health. It will reach its potential only if implemented with care, attention and continued cross-party resolve. This is landmark legislation, and we are proud to support it.

15:50

Bill passed and returned to the Commons with amendments.

Crime and Policing Bill

Monday 9th March 2026 Lords Chamber

Report (4th Day)

Northern Ireland legislative consent granted, Scottish and Welsh legislative consent sought. Relevant documents: 33rd and 41st Reports from the Delegated Powers Committee, 11th Report from the Constitution Committee, 5th Report from the Joint Committee on Human Rights.

15:51

Amendment 369

Moved by

[Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames]

369: Before Clause 133, insert the following new Clause—
“The right to protestBefore section 11 of the Public Order Act 1986 (advance notice of public processions), insert—“10A The right to protest(1) Everyone has the right to engage in peaceful protest, both alone and with others.(2) Public authorities have a duty to—(a) respect the right to protest,(b) protect the right to protest, and(c) facilitate the right to protest.(3) A public authority may only interfere with the right to protest, including by placing restrictions upon its exercise, when it is necessary and proportionate to do so to—(a) protect national security or public safety,(b) prevent disorder or crime, or(c) protect public health, or the rights and freedoms of others.(4) For the purposes of this section “public authority” has the same meaning as in section 6 of the Human Rights Act 1998 (acts of public authorities).””Member's explanatory statement
This amendment would introduce an express statutory right to protest, imposing both negative and positive obligations on public authorities while recognising that the right to protest may need to be limited to protect other legitimate public interests.

[Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)]

My Lords, in opening this group, I will speak principally to Amendment 369, which is in my name and the names of my noble friend Baroness Doocey, and the noble Baronesses, Lady Fox of Buckley and Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb. I will also speak to Amendments 369A, 372A, 372B, 372C and 373.

Amendment 369 brings to Report our amendment calling for a strong statement in domestic law of the right to protest. Nothing has been said in Committee or so far on Report that has even started to persuade these Benches that this Bill does not need within it a strong statement of a statutory right to protest, which would both supplement and complement rights of the citizen under the ECHR. Our Amendment 369 is co-signed by the noble Baroness, Lady Doocey, and others, as I have said, and I accept entirely that the right to protest is, in part at least, enshrined in Articles 10 and 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights: Article 10 is on “Freedom of expression” and Article 11 is on “Freedom of assembly and association”. As I mentioned in Committee, the convention rights are circumscribed because they

“may be subject to such formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society, in the interests of national security, territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals”,

or for the protection of the rights and freedom of others.

A significant feature of the rights under the convention is that the degree to which the European Court of Human Rights may interpret or enforce those rights is subject to what is known as the “margin of appreciation”, accorded to individual signatory countries to decide how they, as nation states, interpret and enforce those rights. It is only where countries stray beyond that margin of appreciation that the European Court of Human Rights will hold a signatory nation in breach.

What our amendment would do, that is new and not encompassed by the convention, is make it absolutely clear that in this jurisdiction, public authorities have a threefold duty in relation to protest: first, to respect, secondly, to protect, and, thirdly, to facilitate the right to protest. That duty is dynamic and positive. Our amendment is an important and clear statement of what every citizen would have a right to expect and insist upon from government, local and national. Government would have a duty to act, which is far stronger than a duty merely to refrain from interfering. Such a firm statement would be a more powerful protection than the convention rights, precisely because the margin of appreciation of which I spoke would be irrelevant.

I need remind the Government only that it is their own express view that how we determine and apply the limits of Article 8, on the right to respect for private and family life, is open to discussion, as is the proper area for domestic legislation which they propose to introduce, in order to limit the way that Article 8 might act within the margin of appreciation. That is their stated position in the context of immigration law. That is a position the Government are entitled to take under the European convention, in my view. But there is a risk that more extreme Governments might push the boundaries of what is acceptable in the context of other human rights, including the rights under Articles 10 and 11.

Members will no doubt remember that in Committee there was clear agreement around the House that, whether dealing with convention rights or rights under our amendment, we would have to strike a balance between the stated rights and the applications of the limitation—either under the convention, in the case of the ECHR rights, or under domestic legislation, if it were amended as we seek. But there is one specific area where that distinction may be important. The convention in both Articles 10 and 11 permits restrictions for the protection of morals, as was apparent from the passage I quoted. In a society as diverse as ours, with mixed secular and faith-based belief systems and philosophies, that is not an area in which we on these Benches would wish to see, let alone advocate for, a derogation from the convention rights or a restriction of our rights for the protection of morals. Our amendment would not permit a derogation or restriction on that ground alone.

We also discussed the possibility in Committee that future Governments might not be as enlightened as our present Government no doubt are. I fear we can see the possibility that a future Government, more extreme than this one, might wish to introduce restrictions on freedoms of speech or assembly. In Committee, the Minister, the noble Lord, Lord Hanson, expressed optimism that this would not happen. He more or less said that if a Government were elected, they could do what they liked. I am not so sure. I say in answer to that point made by the noble Lord, Lord Hanson: let us make it more difficult to change the citizen’s rights for the worse, while we can.

There was also discussion in Committee as to whether there might not be differences between the convention rights and the rights under our amendment. The suggestion was made by some that this would give rise to satellite litigation. For my part, I do not believe that the convention rights would in any sense either clash with or limit the rights of people in this country under the clear rights that would be enshrined in domestic law pursuant to our amendment.

On a practical level, I acknowledged then, and acknowledge now, that policing protests can be an expensive exercise and that it is sometimes difficult for the police to draw a balance—which often has to be drawn in advance—between overpolicing and underpolicing protests. That makes it even more important to spell out in clear terms what the right to protest is, so that the police and local authorities may be accorded the necessary resources for them to carry out that duty to respect, protect and facilitate protest.

16:00

Noisy protests—of which we have heard many—repeated protests and protests on unpopular causes are, and have been for centuries in this country, part of the stuff of life in our democracy. We have seen what the High Court thought of the arrest of so many peaceable protesters last year. What happens next remains to be seen. It is not a question of what we may think of their cause; it is a question of not stifling their rights. These rights are fundamental to our way of life and should be protected with determination and clarity.

I turn to the other amendments in this group tabled by those on these Benches. Amendment 369A in the name of my noble friend Lord Strasburger on face coverings at protests is a minimalist position of support for the right of the protester to attend a protest without revealing their identity. It would allow the protester to appear in disguise, and provides a defence of reasonable excuse for wearing a face covering. It is just a fact that people may have many legitimate reasons for disguising themselves. They may not want employers, teachers, parents, partners, political opponents or, in the case of people in public life, simply members of the public to recognise them or be aware of their attendance at a protest—and why not? We can see no justification for a limitation of that right, unless it is for camera surveillance, to which we will turn later today, which we regard as pretty unjustified anyway without really serious regulation, of which there is currently not a whit.

Amendments 372A, 372B and 372C in my name and that of my noble friend Lord Strasburger are intended to ensure that Clause 139, which restricts protests in the vicinity of places of worship, will succeed in protecting worshippers and members of religious communities carrying out religious activities in places of worship, while avoiding the problem that, frankly, affects the clause as unamended. That problem is that the unamended clause would enable the restriction of protests in the vicinity of places of worship—protests that are unconnected with either worshippers at that place of worship or with the act of worship or other religious activities in that place.

It is true that there is a condition in the Bill that persons of reasonable firmness should be deterred from worshipping there or carrying out religious activities before the right to restrict would kick in. That could be the case in any demonstration that was local and might keep people of reasonable firmness away. The reality is that what the Government were trying to do when they drafted that clause was to protect worshippers from sectarian demonstrations by opponents of those worshippers, and from hate speech. It is about, as was rightly acknowledged, protecting Jewish people near synagogues and Muslims in mosques. It is about protecting against religious discrimination, but I regret that we may hear from the Minister the suggestion that we should agree to this clause without the specificity that is provided by our amendments on the basis that the police do not have to make a distinction—that was the basis that was raised in Committee. It is up to them, it is said, but the Bill is about making appropriate provision in law for the police to have powers to restrict protests in particular circumstances and in those circumstances only.

It is no answer to an objection that the Bill is too wide that the police do not have to use excessive powers that are granted to them. We have always been astute in this country to restrict police powers and not to give the police discretion that they do not need to use. To do otherwise would be to substitute the discretion of the police for the definition in law of police powers. I completely agree with those who say, as the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, has pointed out on many occasions, that the police are granted a difficult job, but it is not for government to say to the police, “You can have these powers, and you have to decide when to use them”. It is for Parliament to establish powers that are restricted to what is needed. To legislate on any other basis would be inimical to the rule of law, of which the proper definition of police powers is a necessary feature.

Amendment 373 in my name and the names of my noble friends Lady Doocey and Lord Strasburger would remove Clause 140 from the Bill. As noble Lords will remember, Clause 140 deals with the question of cumulative disruption allegedly caused by protests. Many protests cause disruption—disruption by noise, by large numbers of people, by the occasional difficulties to get through the traffic or through crowds, even by roads being blocked or Tube stations being difficult to access. There are difficulties with passage when protests are about. All these things are the normal incidence of protests. They are the price that we pay for our democratic right to protest.

What is the difference between one protest, which does not give rise to such a restriction as is suggested, and repeated protests? It is that repeated protests are often required to persuade government or authority that something must be done. Of their nature, repeated protests are more likely to be justified and more likely to be effective, whether that be farmers protesting against inheritance tax repeatedly in central London, marches against the Iraq war or any number of protests in Trafalgar Square. The noble Lord, Lord Gove, shakes his head, but when we look back at the history of protests in this country, we see that repeated protests have the utility that they are more likely to be effective. Protest movements take time to build up momentum. That momentum is an important part of their future success. The more justified the protest, the more likely it is to be effective and the more likely it is to be repeated and repeated in the same area.

Clause 140 is an oppressive clause. It would provide the police with the powers to restrict the very protests that are most likely to be justified and effective. There is no way of curing it and we should have none of it.

[Lord Pannick (CB)]

The noble Lord has already accepted that the right to protest has to be balanced against the rights of others. Surely the virtue of the cumulative disruption provision, Clause 140, is that it is totally unacceptable that the rights of others who wish to pray in their synagogue, who wish to get to their synagogue, who wish to get away from their synagogue, should be repeatedly disrupted in the same place every week. The cumulative nature of the disruption pushes the balance in favour of asking the protesters not to cease protesting but to do it somewhere else.

[Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)]

The answer to that is that the cumulative nature of the disruption is not what causes the oppression to worshippers at synagogues or mosques or anywhere else. We have accepted, for the purpose of Report, restrictions on the right to protest near places of worship on condition that it is relevant and that we are talking about the place of worship and worshippers being disrupted. The fact that a legitimate protest is repeated is not a reason for restricting the protests. If the rights and freedoms of others are restricted, that in itself is, under our Amendment 369, a reason for restricting protest, because there is a right to protest. It is not helped by the fact that repeated protests are seen as more difficult. I see the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, about repeated protests at synagogues and mosques, but they are covered by our condition on restriction at a place of worship. I beg to move.

[Lord Strasburger (LD)]

My Lords, I rise to speak to Amendment 369A in my name, which we have just been discussing, and to Amendments 372A, 372B, 372C and 373, to all of which I have added my name. Regarding Amendment 369A, Clause 133 seeks to create a new offence of concealed identity at protests. If this clause were enacted as it stands, the police would be empowered to ban all face coverings at a protest with only some limited exceptions concerning the person’s health, religion or work. Many other categories of perfectly law-abiding citizens may have good reasons to conceal their identities at protests—for example, those protesting against a hostile foreign state who fear retribution for themselves or their families, those who might be criticising their own religious or cultural communities, or survivors of sexual violence or domestic abuse who need to stay below the radar for their own safety. None of those is covered by the limited exemptions in Clause 133.

To solve this problem, Amendment 369A would provide a defence of reasonable excuse for the offence of concealing identity at protests, thereby putting the burden on police officers to justify why they believed that wearing a face covering at a protest made the suspect arrestable. This amendment strikes a careful balance between allowing the police to prevent public disorder and protecting the many law-abiding citizens who have legitimate reasons for wanting to exercise their freedom of expression anonymously.

I have signed Amendments 372A, 372B and 372C in the name of my noble friend Lord Marks. Clause 139 seems to have been drafted to give reassurance to Jews, Muslims and other denominations that they can attend their place of worship without feeling intimidated by protests in the vicinity of their synagogue, mosque, church or whatever. That sounds to me like a laudable objective. What is not to like? The difficulty is a severe unintended consequence caused by the drafting. The sheer number of places of worship in a country as old, religiously diverse and densely populated as Britain that could inadvertently become no-protest zones is enormous. Here in Westminster, Parliament Square and Trafalgar Square are both in the vicinity of one or more churches, and yet they frequently host major demonstrations. They could become off limits. Few if any large spaces in central London or any other city would escape the risk posed by Clause 139 of being ruled too close to a place of worship for a demonstration to be allowed. The Government may well say that this is not the intention of Clause 139, but that is exactly what the clause as drafted permits a senior officer to do.

My Lords, Amendments 372A, 372B and 372C would solve the problem by making a ban on protests near a place of worship possible only when the protest is directed at or connected with a place of worship or persons likely to worship there. Demonstrations that are unconnected with a nearby place of worship or that are in its vicinity purely by coincidence would be unaffected by Clause 139—problem solved.

16:15

Clause 140 amends the Public Order Act 1986 to impose a duty on police to consider the so-called “cumulative disruption” resulting from repeated protests in a given area. This clause gives the police unprecedented powers to restrict or prohibit protests if they are expected to be too disruptive. This represents a grievous attack on the right to protest, which is vital to our democracy. Its overly broad framework empowers the police routinely to curb freedom of expression and assembly as exercised through peaceful protests. It significantly expands the definition of serious disruption. This would allow the police to prohibit peaceful demonstrations pre-emptively if, in their opinion, an area has been the site of too many protests. That is a very broad discretion. Presumably it would apply if the protests in question were organised by different groups who advocate for different causes. This could create a first-come, first-served version of free speech whereby areas are given what could be described as a protest allowance, at the whim of the local constabulary.

Furthermore, Clause 140 leaves the definition of the area in question entirely at the discretion of the police. This power permits the police to move a demonstration to a different part of the same square, another part of town or even a difficult-to-reach rural area. Similarly, Clause 140 does not specify within what timeframe disruption would have to be repeated to be considered cumulative. The suggestion that so-called “cumulative disruption” should be taken into account in considering conditions for restrictions on or prohibitions on protests is also disproportionate. Why should one person’s right to protest be extinguished simply because somebody else has already protested in the same location, about the same cause or a different one?

If enacted, this power would give the police the power to ban or curtail repeated protests, which are likely to be on the most important causes—those most worthy of protest and most protected by the courts. No protest movement has ever brought about change through a single demonstration. The civil rights, suffragette and anti-apartheid movements relied on repeated, cumulative demonstrations. This clause gives the police far too much discretion to curtail and prevent peaceful protests on the most important matters. Clause 140 is a bad idea, badly drafted and with many bad outcomes. It should not stand part of the Bill.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, before I speak to my amendments in this group, I would like to say that I learned to read a long time ago—more than 70 years ago, before I went to school. This alphabet soup of a Bill is quite confusing, partly because so many people disagree with it. The noble Lord, Lord Hanson, should perhaps be aware that it is moderately unusual to have this many amendments; perhaps it would help if he accepted one or two. Obviously, all of my amendments are incredibly reasonable, so I urge him to pick them up. My first amendment in this group would solve the problem outlined by the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, so I expect his strong support on that.

The noble Lord, Lord Marks, moved Amendment 369 on the right to protest. In Committee, we were all reassured that this was not necessary, because the right to peaceful protest is already protected under the Human Rights Act. We were correctly reminded that Articles 10 and 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights protect the freedoms of expression and assembly, and that public authorities are already bound by those duties, but that reassurance is based on the assumption that those protections will remain intact. As the noble Lord, Lord Marks, pointed out, we cannot be sure of that; we cannot speak for future Governments, who might cause our right to protest to deteriorate.

Over recent years, under this Government and the previous one, we have seen a steady erosion of our right to protest and an expansion of police powers to restrict those protests. Each time, we are told, “The powers are modest—you will hardly notice them”. Of course, that is not true, because the effect is cumulative, damaging and leads to much greater constraint on people who are campaigning and protesting. The balance is shifting and Parliament continues to widen state power without at the same time reaffirming the underlying right.

I have also cosigned Amendment 369A, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Strasburger. There are many legitimate reasons why people might want to cover their faces at protests. Some noble Lords on this side of the Chamber might benefit from wearing masks sometimes, just to hide their look of derision at other noble Lords who are speaking coherently, cogently and sensibly. People might fear losing their job if their political views were known. They might fear backlash from family or their local community. They might be worried about racial profiling, particularly given the increased use of facial recognition technology. They might be protesting against a foreign regime and be genuinely concerned about repercussions for loved ones overseas. It is not unreasonable to wear masks.

I turn now to my Amendment 372ZA. Clause 139 is very problematic. It gives the police significant new powers to restrict protests near places of worship. I am an atheist, but I absolutely protect the right of people to worship freely, as they want to, and without fear. At a time of rising antisemitism, Islamophobia and racism, that duty is paramount for us here in Parliament. All our diverse communities must be supported and defended, and every faith group must have the ability to worship freely. As drafted, Clause 139 risks undermining that balance between rights. If the Government are not prepared to remove it, it must at the very least be clarified and narrowed. My amendments are offered as a compromise and an attempt to introduce clarity where the drafting is currently vague and overly broad.

My amendments, which address the phrases “in the vicinity”, “within 50 metres” and “the purpose of intimidating”, seek to establish clarity on these broad definitions in Clause 139. The clause seeks to restrict the right to protest by giving the police new powers to ban or restrict protest “in the vicinity” of places of religious worship, based on the false premise that these powers are required to protect freedom of religion. “In the vicinity” is a vague definition that could mean 10 metres or 10 miles. At the very least, the clause must be amended to make it more specific and contained, with an eye towards protecting Article 11—the right to freedom of assembly. “In the vicinity” needs to be clarified in terms of a specific distance. Many cities and towns have a large concentration of places of worship. The clause as it stands could make it virtually impossible to protest, as other noble Lords have said, including taking protests to Parliament or other such places on which protesters might wish to focus in order to make their point to people in positions of influence—for example, in government.

The Green Party feels that 50 metres is a sensible compromise that would provide clarity for police on the threshold for imposing conditions on protests while protecting the Article 11 right. Amendment 372ZA would help the police because it is so specific that they could take a tape measure to protests to make sure that protesters were at the designated distance. It would also help protesters, because they would know whether they were legally allowed to protest at that point or not. I urge the Minister to think about this and to clarify what “in the vicinity” means. It is far too vague to bring in in legislation. Surely the Government must see that.

The phrase “may intimidate” again is terribly vague, and I do not understand why anybody would put that in a Bill. This is bad writing—which is why we have so many amendments labelled ZA, ZZ and BZ and so on Report. All our diverse communities have to be supported and defended, but Clause 139, as it stands, will not do that because it is too vague. There are existing powers to address racial and religious hatred and violence. Under the Public Order Act 1986, the police can impose conditions on protests that may compel people not to worship, disrupt the activities of an organisation or intimidate or harass people in the vicinity. My amendment tries to make things clearer. As always, I am just trying to help the Government get things right.

[Lord Pannick (CB)]

Before she sits down, I put to the noble Baroness that her amendments would not achieve the purpose that I understand the Government to have with Clause 139. If you confer the power in relation only to a protest that takes place within 50 metres then you are not going to achieve the purpose, which is to ensure that people are able to get to and away from their synagogue every Saturday. If there is a march of hundreds or thousands of people that impedes their access, 50 metres is not going to work. As I have already put to the noble Lord, Lord Marks, protest is a balance between the rights of protesters and the rights of other people. The noble Baroness is ignoring the rights of others.

[Noble Lords]

Hear, hear!

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

I will speak to you all later.

I think the noble Lord is wrong. You cannot have these vague terms. I would have thought the noble Lord would appreciate the fact that you need clarity in legislation. How can the police know what “in the vicinity” means? How can they possibly make good judgments? They already make terrible judgments based on some of the laws that we have already passed; they overstep the mark constantly because they cannot be clear about exactly what it means and what we think it means. I argue that 50 metres is a sensible limit.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I have added my name to Amendment 369, which would introduce an express statutory right to protest and impose negative and positive obligations on authorities that recognise the right to protest. We were told in Committee, as the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, has reminded us, and we have been told again that this will not be necessary. However, as the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, has rightly pointed out, this group of amendments indicates exactly why it is necessary. This whole chapter, as the noble Lord, Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames, has explained, would undermine the right to protest.

A constant concern that I have with this Bill is that it is just the latest iteration of adding new powers to a veritable arsenal of laws already on the statute books undermining and curtailing protests. The problem is that we keep making new laws that seemingly are then not enforced, or not consistently enforced, leading to a demand that something more should be done, and more and more. Each time, that normalises the chipping away of the right to protest as a democratic norm—not as an unqualified right but as a norm.

I am just back from Manchester where, last week, two masked and arm-banded pro-Ayatollah Khamenei supporters—apologists for the terror-backing Iranian regime—rode horses at Iranian dissidents in the middle of the day on the streets of Manchester. It was terrifying, intimidating and violent in many ways. What struck me was that the Greater Manchester Police officers who were asked why they did not intervene just shrugged and said, “What can we do?” I am not advocating that we have a new law specifically banning the riding of horses by pro-Islamists through the streets. I am suggesting that we need more decisive police action and use of the laws that we have when they are required. I worry about building up more and more laws.

That is one of the reasons why I share with other noble Lords real concerns about the vague phrasing of Clause 139. The absence of a clear definition of “vicinity”, as has been explained, would allow the police to create substantial no-protest zones around places of worship, while giving powers to ban demos that may have the effect of intimidating people so as to deter them from religious activities. That is a very permissive power. Interestingly, the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, described what he considered Clause 139 to be. He talked about people being intimidated on Saturdays at synagogue. We all recognise that, but that is not what Clause 139 says. I would be more sympathetic if it was, but, in fact, it is a very general clause that might have unintended consequences.

16:30

I have no sympathy with a lot of the pro-Palestinian demos in the vicinity of synagogues and the ongoing intimidation of Jewish citizens, but the police already have extensive powers to arrest people for religiously aggravated hate speech, as we heard in great detail last week. Why are not they using them? There are existing powers available to the police under the Public Order Act to allow them to impose conditions on demos that intimidate people who wish to engage in worship. So what is Clause 139 for? Whatever it is for, I am afraid it might have unintended consequences.

The phrase “may intimidate” worshippers, and being told so by religious leaders, would potentially enforce a form of blasphemy law in the vicinity of a place of worship. This is a question asked by Big Brother Watch, and it has a point. I cannot see how Clause 139 does not prioritise religious sensitivities at the expense of freedom of expression and assembly.

That could happen in two ways. First, how do we ensure that Clause 139 does not insulate religious institutions from scrutiny or opposition? For example, victims of sexual abuse by religious leaders might want to protest outside a Church of England church or a Catholic cathedral. Former Muslim women who want to protest against religious practices such as FGM or the enforced wearing of burkas could also be barred.

Secondly, the sheer number of places of worship in a country that is as religiously diverse and closely populated as Britain could mean that a significant proportion of the country is turned into a no-protest zone, as has been explained. A single street could be the site of a specific private business, media organisation or government health institution alongside various places of worship. Clause 139, as it is presently drafted, could allow worshippers or religious leaders to ask police to pre-emptively restrict protests not aimed at them at all but covering topics that the religious might consider offensive or intimidating—for example, a women’s rights pro-choice demo aimed at an anti-abortion charity’s offices in the vicinity of a Christian church, or a pro-Israel demo at a media organisation complaining about biased TV coverage but in the vicinity of a mosque. You could see how that could happen.

Many issues, when viewed through the lens of religious sensibilities, could be claimed to be intimidating to worshippers. Clause 139 could seriously censor and silence such views in relation to protest bans. That may not be what the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, or the Government think Clause 139 is about, but it is what the drafting would allow.

On the ban on face coverings, the JCHR has noted that the lack of a clear definition of what could constitute a protest in relation to the new offence of concealing identity could criminalise all forms of identity concealment, and that that would unjustifiably interfere with the right to peaceful protest.

Amendment 369A from the noble Lord, Lord Strasburger, is modest and proportionate. It is important because it tackles what Justice has noted as poor drafting that could make criminals of protesters who have legitimate reasons for insisting on remaining anonymous. All the noble Lord suggests is a reasonable excuse clause, and that would not prevent the police dealing with those wearing face coverings to intimidate and avoid arrest. As we have heard, the police already have such powers under the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act but, regardless, they do not use them.

However, the new powers are problematic. What is most extraordinary—I raised this in Committee, and maybe the Minister can answer this time—is that the Government know you cannot have a blanket ban so they have made three exemptions, for religious, health or work reasons, but those exemptions seem to be completely arbitrary; I have no idea why they chose them. They are certainly inadequate as a way of reflecting important reasons why a protester may want to protect their privacy in public.

To those who cry, as they did in Committee, “If you’ve done nothing wrong then you should have nothing to hide. Why would you wear a face covering?”, I suggest they have never worked in one of the many public sector workplaces where having the wrong opinions can lead you to be disciplined or treated with social ostracism. Try being a gender-critical feminist academic going on a demo without having your face covered; you might find yourself on the wrong side of academia when you go back to work. They have never been the victim of stalking or harassment and so wanted to conceal themselves when on a public protest that could, by the way, be filmed by the mainstream media or livestreamed by phone. They have never had to defy their strict community or religious strictures or prohibitions, or have never been a transnational dissident taking on the Iranian or the Chinese regime.

Anonymity is an important enabler of freedom of assembly and association. While, as we will see later, there is a problem with the police deploying live facial recognition at protests per se, a prohibition on face coverings at protests could represent a step towards the possibility of widespread biometric surveillance at protests as well. I am afraid there is no presumption that the right to protest is secure in today’s political climate, never mind under a future Government, and if the clauses in the Bill are not reined in, the right to protest will be even more fragile.

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

I agree with much of the discussion about this important group, but I remember that this is Report. While I share particularly the concerns about cumulative disruption, because it is Report, not Committee, I will confine my remarks to one speech in this group, with no interventions, and focus on Amendments 369 and 369A as briefly and succinctly as I can.

I agree with the noble Lords, Lord Strasburger, Lord Pannick and Lord Marks, and the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, about Amendment 369A. These arguments were rehearsed with great precision in Committee. The example was given of an Iranian dissident protesting and being concerned about reprisals—and you could substitute other countries and their embassies for Iran, that was just the one that came up that day.

In the clause, the Government acknowledge that there should be some defences to the offence of wearing a mask on a protest—I have concerns about the offence itself because it presupposes that protest is a slightly dodgy thing to begin with, and I do not agree with that—and included health, religious observance and work as justifications for concealing identity, but fear of reprisals was not included. The reasonable excuse defence proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Strasburger, and his colleagues is a proportionate one, given what the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, said earlier about balancing rights. I urge my colleagues in government to think seriously about the noble Lord’s amendment because the defences currently to the offence of concealing your identity at a protest do not include the fear of reprisals, whether you are a battered woman, someone who disagrees with their employer or, crucially, a dissident outside the embassy of your homeland. I urge my noble friends in government to think again about that.

Just briefly on Amendment 369—I am still at just over two minutes—and enshrining the right to protest as a free-standing clause, even though it is acknowledged by the noble Lord, Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames, that we have Articles 10 and 11 of the convention incorporated into the Human Rights Act, I say in friendship and gently to him that I think this kind of duplication may be a mistake we would come to regret. He is quite right, of course, as are the Government on other matters to do with Article 8, that you can, and should, be more precise in your domestic legislation when attempting to safeguard rights and freedoms, but this is not that much more precise. In effect, this proposed new clause pretty much replicates Articles 10 and 11 of the convention but for the removal of morals. Frankly, I think that morals is a dead letter these days.

As a fellow human rights person—I have been working with the convention and with some Members of your Lordships’ House for over 30 years—I say that that kind of almost duplication is dangerous in legal terms. I urge the noble Lord not to press that one, just as I urge my colleagues in government to support him and others who have signed up to broaden the defence in Amendment 369A to the offence of wearing a face covering at a peaceful protest.

[Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)]

Before the noble Baroness sits down, can I ask her gently to explain why she does not accept that the margin of appreciation permits the Government to do things outside what we would want to see? I know that she and I both are great advocates for the ECHR, and she knows that, but the problem is that the margin of appreciation can be taken advantage of to allow restrictions we would not want to see. The first and principal point I might make in relation to the duplication point is that having the right to protest enshrined in domestic statutory law does away with the possibility that the margin of appreciation should allow restrictions that this Parliament would not wish to see.

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

I was trying to be brief—this is Report—but, with the leave of the House, I will answer, again as briefly as I can. I know that not everyone agrees and not every jurist agrees, but as far I am concerned, the margin of appreciation was always intended to be an international concept for an international court. Once you get to Strasbourg, it is quite right that a margin of appreciation applies so that Strasbourg respects the legislation and the jurisdiction of domestic legislators and judges.

I do not see it as a domestic legal principle at all, so I do not see that it is for even the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom to be operating a margin of appreciation when it applies the Human Rights Act domestically. I do not see that as the problem that the noble Lord does. The way that you put meat on the bones of human rights protections is with the Police and Criminal Evidence Act, with the detail of the public order statute book; hence I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Strasburger, about having a proper defence to face concealment. That is the detailed meat on the bones, not drafting a right to protest that pretty much replicates Articles 10 and 11.

If the concern—and I would understand this—is that a future Government will come in and scrap the Human Rights Act and pull out of the ECHR, why then have colleagues piggy-backed on to Section 6 of the Human Rights Act in the way that they drafted the right to protest? That is a mistake. I do not want to give up on the Human Rights Act and the ECHR; I will defend them as long as I have breath in my body. That is the approach because it is a hostage to fortune to have free-standing replication of particular rights in particular statutes, when we have the precious protection of an overarching Human Rights Act that applies to the interpretation of all law.

[Lord Faulks (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, the right to protest is an interesting concept. We all agree, on all sides of the House, that there is a right to protest. But, as with most rights—the right to free speech or the right to assemble, for example—in English common law it is not part of our law but part of our common law. We have an absence of fundamental liberties; you are free to do things unless the law otherwise prevents them. So it would be slightly odd to have the right to protest, without any of these other rights, simply inserted into our law. How would it work?

The point about public order legislation is that it always has to balance various interests: the right to protest, along with the right of those affected by those protests—third parties—and of course the police, who have to enforce what is often very difficult and complex legislation. It has to respect those various rights. The European convention did not invent these rights, but they are reflected in its Articles 10 and 11, both of which are qualified rights, not absolute rights. As Strasbourg has made clear, it is perfectly acceptable for individual Governments to determine, by reference to the circumstances that obtain in their countries, what limits are reasonable to place on those rights. Strasbourg has said a number of times that it is not likely to interfere with those. So imposing on top of our public order legislation this right to protest would, I respectfully suggest, cause only confusion in our law, making it difficult for courts and the police.

16:45

The noble Lord, Lord Marks, feared what might come and suggested that this should therefore be in some way hard-wired into our law, making it more difficult for any Government in future to circumvent the difficulties. Well, with great respect, Parliament cannot bind its successors. If a Government decided that they wanted to circumscribe the right to protest, they could do that. So I am afraid I do not think this helps. There are sufficient protections. What is interesting and difficult as a challenge is finding where the limits lie, but this is not an answer.

[Lord Hacking (Lab)]

My Lords, this is indeed Report and I have a great deal of sympathy with the amendments that the noble Lord, Lord Marks, spoke to. I also take the point of the noble Baroness, Lady Jones: this is a large group, with a large number of amendments. But I will restrict my comments to Amendment 369A.

As the noble Baronesses, Lady Fox and Lady Chakrabarti, said, it is much simpler to apply the test of “reasonable excuse”, rather than the complicated language used in Clause 133(2), where there is a test of whether the wearing of the clothes of concealment had

“a purpose relating to the health of the person or others”.

That is just asking for a complicated interpretation, and the “reasonable excuse” test is, in my view, sounder.

I will make one comment relating to the entirety of Report on this Bill. I, and I am sure other Members of this House, have extreme concern that we are having to sit every night beyond 11 pm to midnight. I am glad to see a nod from the Liberal Democrat Benches. That places great strain, not only on Ministers—I hasten not to ask the noble Lord, Lord Hanson, how many midnights he has been sitting up in this House for. He would find it difficult to count on his fingers: there are only 10 fingers to count on, so I am afraid he does not have enough fingers to count the number of times. So it imposes a strain on him, and it also imposes a great strain on all of us who need or want to participate in this Bill throughout every debate. There is another problem: with the House sitting so late, some important amendments are not considered. This happened to me on Monday last week. I had a very important amendment down, together with others, which was not reached. Indeed, it was not even spoken to. This goes for the whole of Report.

I am blaming nobody: I am certainly not blaming Ministers or the Government Chief Whip, all of whom I greatly respect. But there is a problem, and I cannot help recalling that, on Wednesday last week, when again the House sat to midnight, I was sitting in a committee room in Portcullis House and the annunciator said that the House of Commons rose at 7 pm. There is a disproportionate burden being placed on this House and I protest about it.

[Lord Pannick (CB)]

My Lords, in my experience, the later the sitting, the more persuasive the noble Lord, Lord Hanson, gets—but that is just a personal view.

I shall make one general comment and then make my observations on Amendments 369 and 369A. The modest changes—and they are modest—introduced in the Bill by the Government to public order legislation do not justify some of the alarmist comments that we have heard today about the death of the right to protest in this country. Protest is alive and well, as we see constantly, and will continue to be alive and well—and there is nothing in this Bill or in the Government’s proposals that will stop the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, and others protesting against matters they disapprove of—so let us keep this in perspective, please.

[Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer (LD)]

I thank the noble Lord for giving way, but perhaps I could give him a very small example of something that is completely relevant to what he says. On 5 March this year, the Metropolitan Police raided a Quaker meeting house and arrested a number of young, non-violent activists who were being trained in non-violent protest. How can that happen? They were not even protesting: they were just planning how to be non-violent at protests. The noble Lord must concede that that would have a chilling effect on people.

[Lord Pannick (CB)]

I am grateful to the noble Baroness, who makes a forceful point, but my understanding is that that led to no charges. I certainly would not defend what the police did in those circumstances. Perhaps more relevantly, it has nothing whatever to do with the contents of the Bill or the proposals that the Government are putting forward in this proposed legislation.

Amendment 369 is an important amendment, from the noble Lord, Lord Marks, and others, proposing that we should insert into the statute book a right to protest. I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, and the noble Lord, Lord Faulks, that it would be most inappropriate. It cannot be right to introduce a statutory right to protest when we are not introducing into the statute book, and rightly so, any other provision in the European Convention on Human Rights, such as the right to freedom of speech or to religious freedom. The reason for that, as the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, said, is that we already have the protection of the Human Rights Act, which is applied by our judges.

With respect, I do not accept the criticisms made by the noble Lord, Lord Marks, when he focused on the European concept, in the European Court of Human Rights, of the “margin of discretion”. But that is an international concept, as the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, said. There is something similar here—a discretionary area of judgment—but the European concept is an international concept that is not applied by the domestic courts. Then the noble Lord, Lord Marks, said, “Well, we need to put a marker down in case future Parliaments interfere with the right to protest”. But nothing that we do today will prevent a future Parliament, should it wish to do so, legislating in a way we may think is inappropriate. That is a matter for the future Parliament, and a matter for debate at the time.

The third point the noble Lord, Lord Marks, made was that the convention allowed for a restriction for the protection of morals. He said that was surely inappropriate. Well, yes, but I cannot think of any case where protest has been limited because of a moral view imposed by the police or any other authority. I would not go quite as far as the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, who said—I wrote it down—that morals were a “dead letter” nowadays, which is perhaps a wider proposition than she intended to suggest. But Amendment 369 would be most unfortunate. It would cause confusion and achieve no sensible purpose, if I may respectfully say so.

I take a different view of Amendment 369A in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Strasburger, and I have signed it. It deals with Clause 133, which introduces this new offence of concealing your identity at a protest. No defence of reasonable excuse is included, despite the fact that the Joint Committee on Human Rights, in its fifth report of the Session, proposed that there should be such a defence. The absence of such a defence is very puzzling, as the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, said, because in Clause 133(2) there are defences

“relating to the health of the person … religious observance, or … a purpose relating to the person’s work”.

In Committee I gave an example of why a defence of reasonable excuse is required. The example—and it is a very topical example—was of a man or a woman who wishes to protest outside the Iranian embassy or at some other demonstration against the conduct of the Iranian regime. They may well have a very strong reason for concealing their identity, which is that they have relatives in Iran. Are we really to say that they are committing a criminal offence, despite the obvious need for them to conceal their identity in those circumstances?

With great respect to the Minister, I heard no convincing answer to that point in Committee. That is why I have joined the noble Lord, Lord Strasburger, in suggesting that a defence of reasonable excuse should be added to this new criminal offence. If the noble Lord wishes to test the opinion of the House—and I hope he does, if the Minister cannot give any comfort on this—I will certainly support him.

[Lord Hogan-Howe (CB)]

My Lords, I rise mainly to support the Government. It seems to me that they are broadly taking steps to stop intimidation of the public, not to stop intimidation of the Government, which is what those who support the right to protest seem to be suggesting. The amendments, on the whole, seem to try to restrict that right. For the reasons that many people have already said, I do not think it is necessary.

The job of the police is to ensure that peaceful protesters are able to protest and that they are not intimidated. It is not their job to maximise the impact of the protest, which is what the implications of facilitation seem to suggest. Other people’s rights have to be respected; in the heat of a protest it is very difficult for the police to get that right. It can be a little easier in preparation for the protest, if you are able to plan, but many of these decisions often have to be made during the protest. When there are thousands of people who are emotional and shouting, perhaps outside the Israeli embassy, it can have an intimidating effect on everybody. We have to think seriously about how the police are able to implement these amendments.

I accept that proportionality is a very important part of the ECHR—I would not argue against that—but it is quite hard for the cops to measure this on the ground. In Northern Ireland it became such an issue that we ended up with a Parades Commission, which took the issues away from the police. The way that legislation is going, I suspect it might be wiser to leave someone independent to make these decisions rather than the police. But while it is with the police, it has to be as simple as possible, not because the police are simple—I speak personally—but because it is not easy to get that balance right. This is an acute judgment, not one that is measured in a court.

I want to speak about two other issues. If Parliament decides that it wants face coverings, we have to think carefully about the reasonable excuse. I do not disagree with the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, but I suspect that everybody will have a reasonable excuse. Imagine, as a police officer, confronting somebody about wearing a mask and trying to determine whether they have a reasonable excuse, together with four or five other people in a crowd. It would be almost impossible. Do they have a cold? That is one of the defences in the Act already. I think it would be almost unenforceable. I am not saying that it is wrong to have a reasonable excuse, but it is difficult to determine it during a protest.

[Lord Hacking (Lab)]

Surely the police will go ahead with the arrest and then the courts will decide whether there was a reasonable excuse.

[Lord Hogan-Howe (CB)]

By that time they will already be in a cell, facing the fact that they have been arrested. It is best to avoid that prospect and the dispute you might end up in with a crowd when having to make that decision. The police need as smooth a transition as possible when implementing legislation, so I would be really careful if we carried on with that.

17:00

I do not think the 50-metre test mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, would work. The noble Lord, Lord Pannick, mentioned access and egress from a place of worship but, as importantly, the distance you need to keep from a protester is either throwing distance, shouting distance—so they can make their point and probably abuse somebody in the process—or away from amplified sound, which can be quite a distance. Given the geography of many of the locations where protests might happen, I understand the point about making it a discrete area, but 50 metres could never work and I think trying to determine the distance would be quite difficult. Vicinity can work, because it is a reasonable test. We should leave that for the courts to decide and give the cops the opportunity to make the decision based on the circumstances they face. I am afraid that 50 metres is nowhere near reasonable.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

Can the noble Lord answer the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, about Iranians protesting outside the Iranian embassy, scared for their relatives in Iran?

[Lord Hogan-Howe (CB)]

I avoided having that conversation, because it is a good point. I introduced my points by saying that if a decision is made to impose a ban on masks, a reasonable excuse may be difficult to enforce. I am not expressing an opinion on the noble Lord’s very good point about whether it would capture Iranians who might be in fear of their life from the Islamic Republic of Iran. It is a reasonable point and I am choosing not to express an opinion on it.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

Can I pick the noble Lord up on one point? It is very interesting to hear him say that the law should be simple, because I have heard that from currently serving senior officers. Can he see that our accumulating more and more bits of law makes things not simpler but more complicated for the police? I have been on protests where the police have definitely been quite confused about the legislation. He ought to be arguing with the Government that we should make things much simpler.

[Lord Hogan-Howe (CB)]

I will finish here because this is Report, but 50 metres is too short, although I think vicinity works. I agree with the noble Baroness on clarity; I am not against that, but you have to leave the police some flexibility given the circumstances they face. I do not think vicinity is an unreasonable suggestion. We can make that work, but 50 metres will never work.

[Lord Davies of Gower (Con)]

My Lords, we have started the fourth day on Report with a wide-ranging and interesting debate on the general landscape of public order law. The noble Lords, Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames and Lord Strasburger, and the noble Baronesses, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb and Lady Fox of Buckley, have argued that there are too many statutory limitations on protest in this country. I do not agree, and I suspect I will find myself in much agreement with the Minister on those amendments.

First, I will speak to my Amendments 377C and 377D. Amendment 377C would extend the notification period for public processions from six to 28 days. Currently, Section 11 of the Public Order Act 1986 requires any person organising a protest to notify the police of their proposal to hold it with six days’ notice. The purpose of this period is to ensure that the police can plan their resource requirements effectively. They need to examine the route, number of attendees and timing, gather intelligence on the groups and people involved and assess the likelihood of violence and disorder. If the procession is likely to be large or the cause highly contentious, or if those involved have a history of causing disorder, they may very well need to make contingencies and possibly bring in more officers.

The short period of six days causes significant problems for the police, the public and the organisers of the protest, and it may take the police a substantial amount of time to gather all the available evidence and set conditions so the organisers can often only be notified of those conditions the day before the protest is due to take place. This does not give them adequate time to ensure that they can comply with those conditions, nor does it allow the public and businesses adequate time to adapt.

Policy Exchange’s polling demonstrated that the medium level of notice that respondents believed protest organisers should have to give to the police is 28 days. In its survey, 51% said organisers should have to give at least three weeks’ notice while 45% said the period should be at least four weeks. The 28-day period is also incidentally the same notice period as exists in Northern Ireland, and while I appreciate the different historical and political context in Northern Ireland, it does not seem unreasonable to extend that to England and Wales—especially given the substantial time and effort that police must pour into planning for large-scale protests.

Amendment 377D concerns the criteria on which the police may prohibit a protest. Currently, Section 13 of the Public Order Act 1986 permits the police to prohibit protests if there is a likelihood that the protest will result in serious public disorder. However, that is the only criterion included in that section, meaning there is no ability for the police to prohibit a protest if there is a risk of serious disruption to the life of the community, nor does it allow the police to take into account their own resources and ability to maintain public safety when making their assessment. My amendment would extend the criteria for the prohibition of protest to include where the chief officer of police has a reasonable belief that the protest could result in “serious public disorder”, “serious damage to property”,

“serious disruption to the life of the community”

or that it would

“place undue demands on the police”.

Given the Government's commitment to reform of public order law, I would think they should be able to accept these two amendments. Before the Minister says they need to wait for the review by the noble Lord, Lord Macdonald of River Glaven, into public order and hate speech to report, I gently remind him that the Government were perfectly happy to pre-empt that review and legislate to extend the legislation aggravators based on characteristics last week. If they were happy to do so for that provision, I do not see why they cannot accept mine. However, if the Minister finds himself unable to do so, I am minded to press them to a Division when called.

I will also briefly comment on the other amendments in this group. Amendment 369, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames, and others, would create a new statutory right to protest. While the attention behind this is understandable, it is difficult to see what legal gap it is intended to fill. As the noble Lord, Lord Faulks, has already explained, the right to protest is already protected through the common law and currently through Article 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights incorporated domestically through the Human Rights Act.

However, it is important to recognise that we do not derive our rights in Britain from international treaties or even from domestic statute. The right to protest was protected before Parliament passed the Human Rights Act in 1998 and before we joined the ECHR. It is a right derived from ancient English liberty and our common law inheritance, so placing it into the Crime and Policing Bill in 2026 will not change a thing. I dare say if we were to leave the ECHR and repeal the Human Rights Act, we would still have our ancient freedom to protest intact.

What is more, creating a new declaratory clause risks adding greater complexity without adding meaningful protection. Indeed, by restating rights that are already well established, we may inadvertently create new areas of legal uncertainty rather than clarity for the police, local authorities and the courts, and for those reasons I cannot support that amendment.

A similar concern arises with Amendment 369A, which would introduce a reasonable excuse defence relating to concealing identity at a protest. Clause 133(2) already contains these defences. They include when a person is wearing a face covering for health reasons, religious observance or a purpose relating to their work, and that is a perfectly reasonable and pragmatic list of exceptions.

Amendments 372A and 372AA seek to narrow the circumstances in which conditions may be imposed on protests in the vicinity of places of worship. In doing so, they replace the current test by which a protest may intimidate with a requirement to demonstrate a specific purpose to intimidate. That is a significantly higher threshold. The difficulty is obvious. In practice, intimidation often arises from the circumstances and impact of a protest rather than from an explicitly stated intention. Requiring the police to prove purpose before acting risks tying their hands precisely when communities may feel most vulnerable.

On Amendment 373, as I stated in Committee, we on these Benches are supportive of the introduction of police powers to take into consideration cumulative disruption when placing conditions on protests and assemblies. I do not therefore agree with removing Clause 140. After all, the previous Government tried to introduce this in 2023 and it was the Liberal Democrats and Labour who voted it down in this House at the time, so it is good to see the Labour Party finally has come round to the Conservatives’ way of thinking.

[Lord in Waiting/Government Whip (Lord Katz) (Lab)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lords, Lord Marks, Lord Strasburger and Lord Davies of Gower, and the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, for affording us this further opportunity to debate the right to protest and public order measures in the Bill. I am grateful to all noble Lords who have contributed to this important debate.

The Government fully recognise the importance of peaceful protest in a democratic society. However, Amendment 369, put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Marks, would place in statute a right that is already clearly protected in domestic law—and it is not only me saying that, as we have heard from the formidable legal troika of the noble Lords, Lord Faulks and Lord Pannick, and my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti. As they said, public authorities are bound by the Human Rights Act to uphold Articles 10 and 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights which cover freedom of expression and freedom of assembly. These rights are qualified and may only be limited when restrictions are lawful, necessary and proportionate. Common law also provides strong recognition of peaceful protest. Introducing an additional statutory provision risks creating overlap and uncertainty, particularly for operational policing, without offering any meaningful new protections.

In their contributions, the noble Lord, Lord Marks, and the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, talked about the risks of, shall we say, a more extreme Government and this paving the way for further restrictions on the right to protest. I can only agree with comments made by a number of noble Lords, particularly the noble Lords, Lord Pannick and Lord Faulks: I hope the occasion never arises, but that is democracy, and any incoming Government that have that kind of mandate would not find it hard to overturn not only provisions that the Government are making in this Bill but the amendment that the noble Lord, Lord Marks, proposes, should it make its way on to the statute book. I am therefore not sure that argument really washes.

The Government remain firmly committed to safeguarding the right to protest. That is one reason why we have asked the noble Lord, Lord Macdonald of River Glaven, to review the current legislative framework. One of the matters being explored as part of the review is—to quote its terms of reference—whether the current legislation

“strikes a fair balance between freedom of expression and the right to protest with the need to prevent disorder and keep communities safe”.

The noble Lord, Lord Macdonald, is expected to report later in the spring. I assure noble Lords that we will consider very carefully all his recommendations, including any proposing a strengthening of the right to protest.

Amendment 369A, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Strasburger, would provide a reasonable excuse defence for concealing a person’s identity at a protest in a designated area and shift the burden of proof away from individuals within that designated area on to police. Instead of requiring a person to justify why they had a valid reason for wearing an item to conceal their identity, as set out in the specified defences, it would place the responsibility on the police to assess, during a live protest, whether the explanation provided was reasonable or not. As we heard from the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, that is not necessarily always an easy thing to do.

Clause 133 currently provides three statutory defences for concealing identity at a protest within a designated area: relating to the health of the person or others; religious observance; or for a purpose relating to that person’s work. The offence carries a reverse burden of proof, meaning it is for the individual to prove they concealed their identity for one of these reasons. I consider this a proportionate and carefully balanced offence.

It is important to highlight that any decision to designate an area and arrest a person concealing their identity must take into account Section 6 of the Human Rights Act 1998, meaning that all decisions must be necessary and proportionate in relation to the right to peaceful protest. It is important to bear in mind that a locality will be designated only when it is thought that a protest activity is likely to involve or has involved criminality, so it is expedient to do so in order to prevent or limit the commission of offences.

17:15

We heard discussion about the fear of reprisals when it comes to transnational repression. I say particularly to my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti that introducing a statutory defence relating to transnational repression would introduce operational complexities for the police, as it is of course the role of the courts, not law enforcement, to assess reasonable doubt and evaluate any defences raised by the defendant. In the context of transnational repression cases, which are often internationally complex, such a defence would place an unnecessary burden on police to disprove claims relating to potential threats to an individual’s safety from a particular state, for example. I stress as well that clear—

[Lord Pannick (CB)]

So is the Minister saying to the protestor at the Iranian embassy that he or she has only two choices: not to protest, or to protest not wearing a face mask and thereby run the risk that their relatives in Iran may be killed or tortured?

[Lord Katz (Lab)]

In that example, I revert to what I said about the locality being designated only if the police suspect that criminality is likely to occur or has occurred on previous occasions. I put it to the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, that a largely peaceful protest outside an embassy and at an appropriate distance would not fall into that category of protest.

As I was going to say, clear operational guidance from the NPCC—

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

It might well be that that protester is just on a general demonstration. If you are an Iranian or Chinese dissident, you might be on a civil rights demonstration, arguing for the right to protest. That would equally be the target of the ire of your authoritarian, anti-protest, anti-civil liberty regime. Can the Minister explain how this cannot possibly chill their right to go on a protest? It is not just the transnational example—other examples were given. Some people will not go on protests because they will be frightened of the consequences.

[Lord Katz (Lab)]

On this having a chilling effect, the new offence will cover only people in the locality who are

“wearing or otherwise using an item that conceals their identity”.

As I said, the police will use this power only if they can say there is going to be criminality on a particular protest, such as a march. That is not a power they are going to be using lightly.

[Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)]

I am sorry to keep pestering the Minister, but the difficulty is that there is absolutely no reason why the criminality has to be connected with the attitudes of those Iranians who are frightened. The criminality simply has to be connected with the protest as a whole. It may be entirely separate from the views, attitudes or desires of the Iranians who, in the example of the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, are likely to be deterred from attending a protest.

[Lord Katz (Lab)]

I do not disagree with the noble Lord. What I am saying is that the police designation of a locality where this offence would apply would be made only in cases where they thought that criminality and an offence would occur. It is not related to the fact that, in this case, there are Iranians protesting. I reflect the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, who, to paraphrase, said that the reasonable defences we list in the clause are common-sense and easily explicable.

[Lord Pannick (CB)]

May I test the patience of the Minister? I am very grateful to him. The defence he is offering—that this applies only if there is criminality—does not explain why Clause 133 recognises the defences of health, religious observance or a person’s work. If the Government recognise those defences, even though they are in the context of criminality, surely the clause should also cover the type of example I have given.

[Lord Katz (Lab)]

The noble Lord can never test my patience too far. I simply say that, in terms of the police’s operational use, there are three clear, easy-to-understand, easy-to-interpret defences one could use in this situation. Fear of dissident reprisal does not necessarily fit into that category so easily. Notwithstanding his inability to test my patience, I am going to make some progress, as we have more to discuss.

Under Amendments 372A, 372B and 372C in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Marks, Clause 139 would apply only where a protest is directed at or connected with the place of worship, before conditions could be imposed. Additionally, Amendments 372ZA, 372AA, 372AB, 372BA, 372BB and 372D in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, would raise the threshold for police intervention by requiring proof that a protest has the explicit purpose of intimidating individuals accessing a place of worship and that it would, in fact, intimidate them. The amendments also propose limiting police powers to protests occurring

“within 50 metres from the outer perimeter”

of a place of worship.

As seen with recent demonstrations, protests can have an unintended impact on the lives of a community and those seeking to exercise their freedom of religion without intimidation or fear. I want to be clear that Clause 139 seeks to address a clear legislative gap arising from such protests. Police currently have powers to intervene where there is a serious disruption to the life of the community or intentional intimidation. However, we have already heard consistently from both the police and religious communities that these thresholds are too high to protect worshippers who feel too intimidated to attend their place of worship, even though the protesters do not intend to have such an effect. Requiring officers to demonstrate both the purpose and effect of intimidation would restrict their ability to act at an earlier stage, reducing operational flexibility.

Clause 139 responds directly to that problem. It does not ban protests; it simply gives the police the ability to impose proportionate conditions where a procession, assembly or one-person protest may create an intimidating atmosphere in the vicinity of a place of worship. This will protect the freedom to worship without undermining the fundamental right to protest. Both rights are essential, and the clause is carefully designed to balance them. As the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, herself said, the duty to protect minority communities and their right to go about their lives—whether it is their freedom of worship or any other aspect—is indeed paramount. The clause seeks to do that.

The noble Baroness’s proposal to introduce a rigid 50-metre boundary would further constrain the police, as we heard from the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe. The noble Baroness calls the proposal in the Bill vague, but I put it to her that the rigidity of a 50-metre boundary goes too far. For example, let us consider the practical example of the proximity of St Margaret’s Church to both this House and Parliament Square. Having this rule in place, notwithstanding any particular provisions on protests in Parliament Square, would make that sort of protest impossible. To use one of the examples promoted by the noble Baroness, Lady Fox of Buckley, any protest outside churches or cathedrals would presumably also be limited in that way.

Activity occurring outside that distance may still create an environment that discourages worshippers from entry, yet the police would be unable to impose conditions unless the protest moved closer. This would undermine the clause’s purpose of enabling proportionate intervention where there is a risk of an intimidatory atmosphere near a place of worship. As noble Lord, Lord Pannick said, that includes the comings and goings—going to and from a place of worship, as well as actually being within the building.

I take this opportunity to thank the noble Lord, Lord Leigh of Hurley, who, I am afraid, is not in his place, for meeting me and members of Jewish community organisations, including the Board of Deputies of British Jews, CST and the Jewish Leadership Council, to discuss the clause. As I reiterated at that meeting, I want to make it clear that the Government will write to police forces and local authorities following Royal Assent to remind them of their existing powers to protect community centres, schools and places of worship. This will ensure that all agencies are fully aware of the tools they already have to respond to intimidatory behaviour in these settings.

Amendment 373, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Marks, seeks to remove the cumulative disruption clause from the Bill. I have been clear that the right to peaceful protest is a fundamental democratic right in this country. However, it should be balanced with the need for individuals and communities to feel safe in their own neighbourhoods. Over the past few years, we have seen the impact of protests on the lives of communities and, of course, the tragic antisemitic terror incident that took place at the Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation’s synagogue on 2 October, which led to the unfortunate murders of Adrian Daulby and Melvin Cravitz. Protests subsequently continued, which highlighted concerns around the protection of specific communities, including Jewish communities, which are affected by the cumulative impact of protests.

There are other examples where communities face serious disruption from protests taking place in the same area week after week. On this, I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Pannick. On the streets of London over the past couple of years, we have seen protests almost weekly. The noble Lord, Lord Marks, is right that the cumulative impact has the effect of forcing home a particular message that those protesters want to make. However, that should not come at the price of other citizens not being allowed to enjoy their regular rights.

[Baroness O'Grady of Upper Holloway (Lab)]

I remind my noble friend that in Committee a number of us raised the statement that was issued by a whole range of civic society organisations, whose members often live in the communities in which they carry out protests. He will recall in particular that the TUC supported that civic society statement.

I speak as one of the perhaps few people in this House who has had responsibility for organising mass national demonstrations in central London. Can my noble friend reassure those organisations that this is not, as they fear, in effect, a quota on national demonstrations in London? Can he also give some guidance to the police on how they pick and choose between those different organisations if there is to be a quota?

[Lord Katz (Lab)]

I thank my noble friend for that and for all the work that she has done in organising those national protests, at least one or two of which I am sure that I have attended.

It is absolutely not a quota. It is simply to say that if you are regularly marching in areas side by side with other communities, that repeated activity should not impede their ability, for example, to come and go to a synagogue. It cannot be right, as I know is the case, that synagogues should have to alter their regular service times on a Saturday morning to allow for protests. There must be a way that police can accommodate the needs of the protesters and of those worshippers. I want to be clear: this is not about imposing a quota on protests. The provision does not allow police to ban a protest but places a duty on senior officers to consider cumulative disruption when deciding whether the serious disruption to the life of the community threshold in Sections 12 and 14 of the Public Order Act 1986 is met.

Amendment 377C, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Davies, seeks to extend the notice period required for planned processions from six days to 28 days. As I explained in Committee, six days provides the police with adequate time to work with organisers who are planning protests to ensure that any conditions imposed are necessary and proportionate. The noble Lord’s Amendment 377D seeks to amend Section 13 of the Public Order Act 1986 to enable a chief officer of police to consider

“serious damage to property, or … serious disruption to the life of the community”

and the demands on police resources when determining whether to apply for an order prohibiting public processions.

Section 13 of the 1986 Act rightly sets out a high threshold for considering whether public processions should be prohibited. Widening the scope of this power, including to take account of police resources, would risk undermining the right to peaceful protest under Articles 10 and 11 and the legislation becoming incompatible with the ECHR. The noble compared this with the measure we discussed last week around aggravated offences. The latter was a clear manifesto commitment announced before the review by the noble Lord, Lord Macdonald of River Glaven.

I hope I have been able to reassure noble Lords who have spoken in this group. They have raised some very legitimate issues about whether existing public order legislation and the measures in Part 9 of the Bill strike the right balance between protecting the right to protest, protecting communities and preventing disorder. As I have said, there is an ongoing review examining just this issue, and I put it to the noble Lord that we should wait for the outcome of that review. Accordingly, this is not the occasion to press any of the amendments to a vote today. On that basis, I ask the noble Lord, Lord Marks, to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)]

My Lords, I will be very brief in explaining why I do not propose to withdraw my amendment. First, our amendment would introduce a dynamic right, with a duty on local authorities and public authorities to respect, protect and facilitate the right to protest. Secondly, of course the margin of appreciation is indeed an international concept, but this Government are planning to legislate on the application of Article 8, and they may be right to do so, but we need to have proper concern about future legislation within the context of the margin of appreciation.

Thirdly, I am not suggesting for a moment that we can entrench legislation. The noble Lord, Lord Faulks, is absolutely right to say that Parliament cannot bind its successors. However, we can, by legislation, make it unattractive to reverse a public duty to support the right to protest. Finally, nothing I have said undermines the balancing of rights between the right to protest and the rights and freedoms of others; but the right to protest is at the heart of our democracy. If the Conservatives are not going to support us on this, so be it: that is very disappointing, but I wish to test the opinion of the House.

17:31

Division 1

Amendment 369 disagreed.

Ayes: 75

Noes: 190

17:42

Clause 133: Offence of concealing identity at protests

Amendment 369A

Moved by

[Lord Strasburger]

369A: Clause 133, page 176, line 10, leave out subsection (2) and insert—
“(2) It is a defence for a person charged with an offence under this section to show that they had a reasonable excuse for wearing or otherwise using the item at the material time.”Member's explanatory statement
This amendment would provide a defence of reasonable excuse to the offence of concealing identity at protests, thereby putting the burden of proof on police officers to justify why they believe that wearing a face covering at a protest made the suspect arrestable.

[Lord Strasburger (LD)]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who contributed to this very thoughtful debate. I point out that Clause 133 already contains three reasonable excuses for the offence, but I do not understand why it contains those three and no others. For example, we have not had a convincing explanation from the Government on the example of the Iranian dissident. Amendment 369A covers all reasonable excuses: the three already in the Bill; the Iranian dissident, who keeps coming up; all the others mentioned in the debate; and any others that we have not thought of yet. I am not satisfied with the responses that I have heard from the Government and I wish to test the opinion of the House.

17:43

Division 2

Amendment 369A disagreed.

Ayes: 88

Noes: 172

17:54

Clause 137: Climbing on memorials

Amendment 370

Moved by

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay]

370: Clause 137, page 179, line 10, at end insert—
“(d) a war memorial which has been listed under the provisions of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 or scheduled under the provisions of the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Areas Act 1979.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment broadens the current definition of “specified memorials” to include any listed or scheduled war memorial, not just those which happen to be Grade I listed at present.

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

My Lords, as I explained in Committee, I support the aims that the Government are seeking to achieve through Clause 137, which creates a new offence of climbing on memorials. Although there is a long history of statues forming part of peaceful protest and standing in dialogue between past and present, there is something special about war memorials, which stand as sacred monuments to those who made the ultimate sacrifice for the freedoms that we now enjoy. It is therefore a particular affront when they are dishonoured or desecrated, especially for the proud comrades, families and descendants left behind by the heroes that they commemorate. So I am glad to see the Government taking action in this area, but I am rather perplexed about the way they are going about it.

The Government have correctly identified a problem of principle—that war memorials are specially cherished parts of our public realm and should not be climbed on in this way. However, in translating that principle into this legislation, they have severely and illogically curtailed it. Rather than applying the power to all war memorials, they say it must only be ones specified by the Home Secretary, and have named just 24 in the initial list included at Schedule 14 to the Bill.

Reading that list, I was pleased to see some very fine memorials indeed, including The Response, Sir William Goscombe John’s splendid memorial to the Royal Northumberland Fusiliers, who raised 52 battalions throughout the Great War, more than any other regiment. It stands in the grounds of St Thomas’s church in the heart of Newcastle city centre, by the Haymarket and the civic centre. It was commissioned by a local ship owner and Conservative MP, Sir George Renwick, to commemorate the raising of four of those “pals” battalions and later dedicated in thanks for the safe return of Sir George and Lady Renwick’s five sons from the Great War. Not as many families were as fortunate as they.

Similar stories stand behind each of the two dozen memorials specified in Schedule 14, Part 1, but it is a curious list both for what it does and does not contain. While the Government’s list has an admirable geographic spread, it does not include some of our most well-known national memorials, such as the Battle of Britain Monument or the Royal Air Force Memorial, to give just two examples from very close to here on the Victoria Embankment. Their proximity to Parliament makes them, sadly, a focus for protest and vandalism far more frequently than some of the memorials currently specified in the Bill, but they are not included. In Committee, we found out why. Schedule 14 simply specifies those monuments that are presently listed grade 1 in heritage and planning terms.

Although the listing system is a vital tool for preserving those assets that we most value as a society, applying it in in this way is fraught with problems. First, the Government have restricted themselves to those memorials that are presently given the highest designation, at grade 1. This misses many thousands of memorials that stand proudly in every parish of the kingdom, sacred to the memory of those who laid down their lives in combat and whose memory surely deserves to be honoured just as much as those inscribed on the memorials set out in Schedule 14. The Government have started with a problem of principle but addressed it only in part.

Secondly, the listing system is predicated on specific criteria. As Section 1 of the planning Act 1990 puts it, listing is for

“buildings of special architectural or historic interest”.

This means that a memorial can be given a higher grading for its sculptural accomplishment than for the subject it celebrates. In Committee, I gave an example of this—the Bill will protect Sir George Frampton’s grade 1 listed statue of Edith Cavell at St Martin’s Place but not Arthur Walker’s grade 2 listed memorial to Florence Nightingale round the corner in Waterloo Place. Is one of those wartime nurses really deserving of greater protection than the other because they happen to have been sculpted by different hands?

Thirdly, I worry that this approach will have a chilling effect on the listing system itself. If designating a monument grade 1 is accompanied by new restrictions and criminal sanctions, will that not deter Ministers and their advisers at Historic England from recommending those higher levels of protection? A better approach, I submit, is to follow what I have proposed in my Amendment 370 and specify any war memorial that has been listed, whether at grade 1, grade 2* or grade 2, or any that has been designated as a scheduled monument. This would avoid the practical problems that I have just set out and answer the problem of principle, on which the Government and I agree much more squarely.

18:00

The other difficulty of basing a list on historical or architectural interest is that it produces something very different from a list of those memorials that we know are frequently targeted in political protest. The people of Newcastle, being well brought up and proud of their community, do not need legislation to tell them not to clamber on memorials to their forebears who died in the Great War. If they ever climb on a monument, it tends to be the one to the second Earl Grey which looms over the city centre, but whether that is because they share the view taken by your Lordships’ House about the Reform Act 1832, I would not like to say. If the Government had simply started by compiling a list of memorials at risk along common routes of protest, they might have included some of the other war memorials and statues of military leaders that line Parliament Square and Whitehall and that are targeted, sadly, more often than those listed in the current schedule.

During the helpful meeting that I had with the noble Lord, Lord Katz, last week, I asked about Sledmere, which boasts two of the two dozen memorials in the Government’s initial list. I like to think of myself as someone with a reasonable grasp of the geography of these islands, but I am afraid that I did not know where in the country Sledmere was. I presumed it must be a hotbed of political protest given that it makes up nearly 10% of the initial list in Schedule 14. In fact, it is a peaceable village of just 400 people in the East Riding of Yorkshire. One of its two entries on the list at Schedule 14 is for its Eleanor Cross, not originally a war memorial but one of the 12 commemorative crosses erected by King Edward I to mark the resting places of the body of his wife Eleanor of Castile as she was borne back to Westminster Abbey from Nottinghamshire, where she died in 1290. The most famous of these crosses is the final resting place at Charing Cross, the point from which all distances to London are traditionally measured.

Like the one in London, the Eleanor Cross at Sledmere is not a 13th-century original but a Victorian replica. It was commissioned in the 1890s by Sir Tatton Sykes, the local squire, and converted into a war memorial by his son Sir Mark, he of the Sykes-Picot agreement, who served as a colonel in the Green Howards and as Conservative MP for Kingston upon Hull Central. He was at Versailles for the peace conference but contracted the Spanish influenza and died in February 1919. It was because of its links to him rather than to Queen Eleanor that the cross was listed at grade 2 in 1966 and upgraded to grade 1 only in 2016, making it eligible for the Government’s protection.

I hope that these examples serve to persuade the Minister to accept my more logical solution set out in Amendment 370, but in case they do not, I have also tabled Amendments 372ZZA and 372ZZB suggesting the addition of just two egregious omissions from the Government’s present list. I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Blencathra for signing all these amendments, as he did in Committee. During our debate in Committee, the noble Lord, Lord Katz, explained that the Home Secretary has already indicated that she intends to specify the as-yet-unbuilt Holocaust memorial intended for Victoria Tower Gardens. Why, then, would she not list the existing Holocaust Memorial in Hyde Park, which was unveiled in 1983? Sadly, that had to be covered in tarpaulin as recently as April 2024 on the advice of the Metropolitan Police, who were concerned that it would be vandalised by antisemitic protesters.

Similarly, the noble Lord told me in Committee that references to “individuals or animals” in Clause 137(8)(a) are to allow for the potential consideration of the Animals in War Memorial on Park Lane, for the existence of which we must thank the late Dame Jilly Cooper. If the Home Secretary is willing to consider specifying this memorial to the animals of war, I hope she will agree from the outset to specify the memorial to the Women of World War II, which was unveiled on the 60th anniversary of VE Day by Her late Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, who served in that conflict as a teenage mechanic and driver in the Auxiliary Territorial Service.

There are many other memorials that I think are worthy of the protections set out in Clause 137, but I am particularly curious to know on what grounds the Government could possibly disagree with the inclusion of the two that I have set out in those amendments. I beg to move.

[The Lord Bishop of Norwich]

My Lords, I support Amendment 370 in the names of the noble Lords, Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay and Lord Blencathra. Across this nation, war memorials, often raised by public subscription of pennies here and tuppences there, stand to hold memories of those who gave their lives—sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, cousins and parents. They are carved in stone, metal, wood or marble. The Whipsnade Tree Cathedral in Bedfordshire is a living memorial planted by Edmond Blyth, a World War I veteran, to commemorate his friends who were lost. They are physical embodiments of sacrifice, courage and collective memory, often within the curtilage of parish churches, each name both precious to someone and precious in the sight of God—ordinary people called to do the most extraordinary things in very challenging times. When they are damaged, it is a hit in the stomach for the whole of that community. It damages how we build our life together.

In recent years we have seen a great increase in younger generations exploring those names, finding out more about those people and giving their lives texture, colour and story. I have been very moved by going to a number of different exhibitions in parish churches across the diocese of Norwich that have showcased those often very young lives that were snuffed out in their prime in the service of this nation, so it is deeply distressing when memorials are damaged. Sometimes they are stolen for scrap metal and melted down, and the hurt that causes is immense.

I hope that these important memorials across the length and breadth of this nation can continue to serve as places to pause, reflect and think again, “Not again”. They are permanent reminders of the horror, destruction and futility of war. I hope that the Minister will accept the eminently sensible Amendment 370 for all the reasons that were so ably outlined by the noble Lord, Lord Parkinson. If the Minister cannot support Amendment 370, I hope that the Government will support Amendments 372ZZA and 372ZZB.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

My Lords, I think it is very odd that there should be a distinction made by the Government between a memorial to Florence Nightingale and a memorial to Edith Cavell. That is purely an example that the noble Lord, Lord Parkinson, has given us. If that is so, what on earth is the point of the clause?

[Lord Davies of Gower (Con)]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Parkinson for tabling these amendments that seek to ensure that our memorials of national and historic importance are afforded the respect and protection they deserve under the new offence created in Clause 137. As was noted in Committee, the offence of climbing on specified memorials was introduced to address gaps revealed by recent protests around war memorials, such as the Royal Artillery Memorial and, indeed, around the statue of our great wartime leader Sir Winston Churchill just outside this place. It was first introduced as part of the previous Government’s Criminal Justice Bill, and it is welcome that this Government have taken up the mantle.

Under the current drafting, however, only grade 1 listed memorials are specified, together with the statue of Sir Winston Churchill, but the list does not capture other memorials of equal national significance. As my noble friend has argued so eloquently, using grade 1 listed memorials does not serve a real practical purpose. It is much more about administrative ease. Why does Sledmere get two specified memorials but the Women of World War II Memorial gets no such protection? Amendment 370 would broaden the definition of “specified memorial” to include any war memorial that has been listed or scheduled, not just those that happen to be grade 1 listed.

That approach aligns with the fact that the significance of a memorial is not solely a function of its listing grade but of the history it commemorates and its role in national remembrance. Expanding the scope in this way provides a more objective and inclusive basis for protection and avoids arbitrary outcomes based on historic listing decisions.

Amendment 372 complements Amendment 370 by adding two memorials of particular national importance: the monument to the women of the Second World War in Whitehall, which honours the immense contributions of millions of women during that conflict, and the Holocaust memorial garden in Hyde Park, which stands as a poignant reminder of the horrors of genocide. Including those memorials recognises the breadth of sacrifice in the diverse stories that make up our collective history. I hope the Government will concede to this. If they do and my noble friend is content, so will I be.

[Lord Katz (Lab)]

My Lords, I am grateful to everyone who spoke in this short but important debate, particularly to the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Norwich, who spoke very movingly about the power of memorials in every community and the hurt that communities feel when they are damaged or disrespected. Amendments 370, 372ZZA and 372ZZB, put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay, seek to expand the list of war and other memorials covered by the new offence of climbing on a memorial provided for in Clause 137. I am grateful to him for taking the time to meet with me and officials last week on this issue and for his thoughtful consideration of how best to achieve the Government’s aim, which I think is shared across the House.

As regards Amendment 370, I fully acknowledge that many of the listed and scheduled memorials covered in the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 and the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Areas Act 1979 commemorate events and individuals of great national importance. The Bill intentionally sets out a clear and fixed list of memorials which provides certainty for the public, policing and the courts. By contrast, Amendment 370 would link the offence to memorials listed or scheduled under two separate heritage Acts. Those Acts encompass a far wider range of structures than the focused list in this measure and can change over time. Therefore, this would introduce an uncertainty about which memorials were captured at any given point, undermining the clarity and consistency that the measure is intended to achieve. For this reason, I cannot support the amendment.

The noble Lord, and perhaps the House, will be pleased to hear that I am much more disposed towards his Amendments 372ZZA and 372ZZB, which seek to add the monument to the women of World War II and the Holocaust memorial garden in Hyde Park to Schedule 14. Our aim is to ensure that memorials that have been deemed at threat in the course of a protest are covered by the offence. As the noble Lord has explained, these two memorials have been targeted in recent years. They are both culturally significant, and I agree with him that we need to protect them under this new offence. I am therefore happy to confirm that the Government support these two amendments.

The Holocaust memorial garden in Hyde Park is of course designed to be enjoyed as a garden and people are free to walk within it. I have given consideration to the practical issue of whether the police will be able to enforce this offence. The intention of the offence is to capture the action of climbing and I am confident it will not capture walking on an installation such as the Holocaust memorial garden. There are other memorials listed in Schedule 14 which have steps that may be sat on by members of the public, such as the Royal Artillery memorial in Hyde Park. I am content that, in enforcing this offence, police officers will use their discretion to consider whether an offence is committed.

As I have previously stated, the provision includes a power for the Home Secretary to add further memorials by secondary legislation. This might include the statue of Florence Nightingale in Waterloo Place, as mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Parkinson, and the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss. This Government will be able to add to the list of protected memorials should a site be identified that requires inclusion. I remain of the view, however, that not every memorial or every war memorial can be included. To do so would make the measure unenforceable due to the number of memorials and many, by their nature—for example, commemorative plaques—cannot be climbed on. That said, I accept we need a clear process for deciding whether to add further memorials to Schedule 14.

We will commit to setting out the process through which the Government will add to the specified list of memorials through secondary legislation. We will ensure a methodical and structured approach to consider which memorials have a significant public interest in being included. We will set out the process shortly after the Bill receives Royal Assent. As the Home Secretary has already indicated, this will include the national Holocaust memorial when it has finally been built. I hope that I have been able to persuade the noble Lord, Lord Parkinson, and that the combination of the addition of the two memorials specified in his Amendments 372ZZA and 372ZZB and the process I have outlined for considering the case for adding further memorials will persuade him to withdraw Amendment 370.

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

My Lords, I am very grateful to the Minister for that response and I thank him again for the time that he and his officials gave me last week to discuss this in detail. I am grateful too to the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Norwich, the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, and my noble friend Lord Davies of Gower for their support. As the right reverend Prelate said, these memorials stand very often on hallowed ground, but they are cherished and sacred to people of all faiths and none and inspire new generations to learn about the sacrifices of the past.

I continue to think that the solution in Amendment 370 is the more logical one, but I am grateful to the Minister for what he has said in support of my other two Amendments 372ZZA and 372ZZB, which gives an indication that the Home Secretary is willing to use the powers in Clause 137 where needed to make sure that these protections can be afforded to statues that are targeted by protesters and criminals. I will not press my Amendment 370. I look forward to seeing the two additions to the list and the vigilance of the Home Office and police in the years to come to see where others may need to be added, alas, if necessary. I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 370 withdrawn.

18:15

Amendment 371

Moved by

[Lord Katz]

371: After Clause 137, insert the following new Clause—
“Protests outside public office-holder’s home(1) A person (“P”) commits an offence if—(a) P (alone or with other persons) carries on a protest outside, or in the vicinity of, premises that are used by a public office-holder as a dwelling,(b) P carries on the protest for the purpose of representing to, or persuading, the public office-holder that they—(i) should or should not do something, or(ii) should or should not have done something, and(c) P carries on the protest because of, or in connection with, the public officer-holder being a public officer-holder.(2) Subsection (1) does not apply to premises that are an official residence.(3) It is a defence for a person charged with an offence under this section to show that they did not know the premises were used by the public office-holder as a dwelling.(4) A person is to be taken to have shown the matter referred to in subsection (3) if—(a) sufficient evidence is adduced to raise an issue with respect to it, and(b) the contrary is not proved beyond reasonable doubt.(5) A person who commits an offence under this section is liable, on summary conviction, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding the maximum term for summary offences or a fine not exceeding level 4 on the standard scale (or both).(6) In subsection (5) “the maximum term for summary offences” means—(a) if the offence is committed before the time when section 281(5) of the Criminal Justice Act 2003 comes into force, six months;(b) if the offence is committed after that time, 51 weeks.(7) The following definitions apply for the purposes of this section.(8) “Public office-holder” means—(a) a Minister of the Crown (within the meaning of the Ministers of the Crown Act 1975);(b) any of the Welsh Ministers;(c) any of the Deputy Welsh Ministers (within the meaning of the Government of Wales Act 2006);(d) the Counsel General to the Welsh Government;(e) a member of the House of Lords;(f) a member of the House of Commons;(g) a member of Senedd Cymru;(h) a member of a local authority;(i) an elected mayor of a local authority within the meaning given by section 9H (elected mayors: England) or section 39(4) (elected mayors: Wales) of the Local Government Act 2000;(j) a mayor for the area of a combined authority established under section 103 of the Local Democracy, Economic Development and Construction Act 2009;(k) a mayor for the area of a combined county authority established under section 9(1) of the Levelling-up and Regeneration Act 2023;(l) the Mayor of London or an elected member of the London Assembly;(m) a police and crime commissioner;(n) a candidate at an election for an office mentioned in any of paragraphs (f) to (m).(9) “Local authority” means—(a) in England—(i) a county council;(ii) a district council;(iii) a London borough council;(iv) a parish council;(v) the Common Council of the City of London;(vi) the Council of the Isles of Scilly;(b) in Wales—(i) a county council;(ii) a county borough council;(iii) a community council.(10) “Dwelling” has the meaning given by section 8 of the Public Order Act 1986.(11) “Official residence” means—(a) 10, 11 and 12 Downing Street, London;(b) Admiralty House, Whitehall, London;(c) 1 Carlton Gardens, London;(d) the Palace of Westminster, London;(e) Chequers, Missenden Road, Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire;(f) Dorneywood, Dorneywood Road, Burnham, Buckinghamshire;(g) Chevening House, Chevening, Sevenoaks, Kent.”.Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment creates a new offence relating to protests outside the homes of public office-holders.

[Lord Katz (Lab)]

My Lords, these amendments seek to achieve a similar aim to an earlier amendment tabled in Committee, which the Government withdrew following concerns raised by the Benches opposite. In bringing back these amendments, I hope the revised drafting directly addresses the concerns raised by noble Lords who felt that the initial offence was drawn too widely.

Amendment 371 explicitly requires a protest to be taking place outside a public officeholder’s home for it to be an offence, rather than the broader activity reflected in the Committee amendment. Importantly, a person must be carrying out the protest because of, or in connection with, the public officeholder’s role. Amendment 376 further amends Sections 42 and 42A of the Criminal Justice and Police Act 2001, which confer powers to direct protests away from a person’s home, so as to remove the requirement that protest activity must be linked to a specific future action. As I said in Committee, this change ensures that harassing or intimidatory protests outside the homes of individuals are captured, regardless of whether they relate to past or future conduct.

I recognise the question raised by the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Gower, about whether additional legislation is truly necessary to protect the homes of public officeholders. The Government’s view is that there is an unequivocal need. We are not just talking about providing a feeling of safety to elected representatives; we are talking about the safety of their families too. This principle is foundational to the resilience of the public officeholder and thus to democracy itself. Under the Defending Democracy policing protocol, drafted and agreed by the former Minister for Security and the then Prime Minister, the previous Government set out a clear expectation that any protest outside the homes of elected representatives should be treated as harassment. That intent of the previous Government is what this amendment now achieves.

The role of elected representatives is the backbone of our democracy. Yet the Minister for Security has heard first-hand from colleagues who have tempered what they say or even how they vote because of intimidating behaviour targeted at their homes and their families. We know too that some, particularly women or those from minority backgrounds, are choosing not to stand for office because of the abuse they fear they will face. That is not democracy thriving; that is democracy shrinking. This legislation will give public officeholders and their families an additional layer of protection. It will help ensure that they can carry out their duties without fearing what awaits them at their front door and it will allow their partners, their children and their loved ones to feel safe where safety should be most assured: in their home.

Let me be absolutely clear: protest is a fundamental democratic right, and this Government defend it vigorously. There are proper, powerful places for protest: outside constituency offices, outside Parliament, at town halls, at political events, at rallies. But the home is different. It is where family life happens, where our children sleep, where our partners work, where people retreat from public life. It must not become an area for intimidation or a no-go zone. I beg to move.

[Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)]

My Lords, for all the reasons given by the noble Lord, Lord Katz, protests outside officeholders’ homes are in a special category. These amendments are plainly directed at harassing or intimidatory behaviour towards public officeholders, and they affect the families as well, so we are happy to accept these two amendments.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

My Lords, I wish to add how delighted I am that the Government have done that. It is rather overdue and will give some degree of satisfaction to at least some families of MPs in particular.

[Lord Davies of Gower (Con)]

My Lords, in Committee I raised some strong objections to the amendment that the Government were proposing then. We were concerned that the proposals could inadvertently criminalise canvassing and leafleting an officeholder from a rival political party. We were also concerned about the proposed second aspect of the offence, which could criminalise making representations about a matter relating to the officeholder’s private capacity.

I still have reservations about the principle behind Amendment 371. I do not accept the Government’s argument that all protests outside a public officeholder’s dwelling constitute harassment. That is the stated view of the Government, but I think it is demonstrably false. If a protest outside a public officeholder’s home becomes actual harassment within the meaning of the law then that should be prosecuted as such, and if the protest breaches the peace or becomes highly disruptive then there are already laws to deal with that, but simply saying that any person who wishes to make representations to a politician about their actions or policies outside their house is harassment and therefore unlawful seems a disproportionate infringement of liberty.

Having said that, I am grateful to the Minister for taking our comments on board. The amendment that the Government have tabled on Report is much improved and far more tightly drafted, and I welcome that. Could the Minister confirm that the definition of a protest in the amendment will not include canvassing and leafleting or asking someone to sign a petition? I think we would all benefit from that being on the record. Given that the Government have listened to our concerns, while we are not completely content, we will not oppose this amendment.

[Lord Katz (Lab)]

I thank all noble Lords who have spoken in this debate. I particularly thank the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, because I feel that at this Dispatch Box I do not always meet the high bar that she sets for defending the Government’s position, so it is always good to win her praise.

To pick up on the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Davies, the Government are committed to defending democracy. I therefore assure him that Amendment 371 does not restrict political campaigning. It is perfectly legitimate for campaigners during election time to door-knock and speak to their local public officeholders about different political opinion. Where this crosses the line is when these people choose to protest against the public officeholder at their home.

These government amendments are vital to protecting our democracy. As my honourable friend the Security Minister has made clear, harassment and intimidation must never be accepted as part of a public officeholder’s role. This cannot become the new normal, and the scale of the problem cannot be overstated. It is not simply MPs, either. The Local Government Association’s Debate Not Hate survey in 2025 found that seven in 10 councillors had experienced abuse or intimidation in the previous year. The Speaker’s Conference reported that an astonishing 96% of MPs who responded to their survey had suffered at least one form of abuse, intimidation or harassment. This demonstrates that it is a real problem. Harassment is not simply confined to online spaces; it is very active in the real world too. We must therefore put protections in place not only to keep public office holders safe but to ensure that they feel safe, and that their families are protected. With that, I beg to move.

Amendment 371 agreed.

Amendment 371A

Moved by

[Lord Walney]

371A: After Clause 137, insert the following new Clause—
“Designation and restriction of Extreme Criminal Protest Groups(1) The Secretary of State may by regulations designate a group as an Extreme Criminal Protest Group (“ECPG”) where the Secretary of State reasonably believes that—(a) the group has as its purpose and practice the deliberate commission of one or more of the following offences—(i) an offence under section 1 of the Public Order Act 1986 (riot),(ii) an offence under section 2 of the Public Order Act 1986 (violent disorder),(iii) an offence under section 1 of the Criminal Damage Act 1971 (destroying or damaging property), or(iv) an offence under section 7 of the Public Order Act 2023 (interference with the use or operation of key national infrastructure),(b) such offences are carried out with the intention of influencing public policy, parliamentary debate, ministerial decision-making, or the exercise of democratic functions, and(c) the activities of the group create a risk of serious harm to public safety, democratic institutions, or the rights of others.(2) A designation under subsection (1) does not amount to proscription for the purposes of the Terrorism Act 2000.(3) The following are offences in relation to group designated as an ECPG under subsection (1)—(a) membership of a designated ECPG;(b) promotion of a designated ECPG, including public advocacy, recruitment, or dissemination of the group’s materials;(c) fundraising for a designated ECPG, including soliciting or providing funds or financial benefit;(d) organising, directing or coordinating activities of the group;(e) providing material support, training, funds or equipment to the group where the person knows or ought reasonably to know that the recipient is a designated ECPG.(4) A person does not commit an offence under subsection (3) solely by expressing an opinion or belief that is supportive of a designated ECPG, where that expression does not amount to encouragement or assistance of criminal conduct.(5) An offence under subsection (3) is punishable on conviction—(a) on indictment, by imprisonment for a term not exceeding three years, or a fine, or both;(b) on summary conviction, by imprisonment for a term not exceeding six months, or a fine, or both.(6) Before making regulations under subsection (1), the Secretary of State must lay before Parliament a statement of reasons explaining why the designation is considered appropriate.(7) The statement under subsection (6) may exclude material the disclosure of which would, in the opinion of the Secretary of State, be contrary to the public interest, including on grounds of national security or the prevention or detection of crime.”

[Lord Walney (Lab)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to lead off this grouping on counterextremism. My Amendment 371A, tabled with co-sponsors the noble Lords. Lord Pannick and Lord Hogan-Howe, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Goldsmith, would create a limited mechanism to give the Government the option to seek parliamentary approval to restrict the activities of an extreme criminal protest group that was dedicated to committing criminal damage for political purposes. It would do so without branding individuals or the group as terrorists, and it would expressly rule out criminalising mere expressions of support that did not encourage illegal conduct. If it were applied instead of terrorist proscription, it would avoid the controversy of people being arrested for holding up signs in the manner that has happened so recently with Palestine Action under the provisions of the Terrorism Act 2000.

Following concerns in Committee that the original amendment was too broad and risked unduly restricting freedom of speech and association, we have substantially narrowed its scope. The number of offences here has been narrowed to riot, violent disorder, criminal damage or attempts to interfere with key national infrastructure. There is no possibility of widening those criteria without further primary legislation. Subsection (3) has been clarified so that assisting a designated group would be an offence only where the individual was knowingly furthering the group’s aims. Expressions of support for a group that do not amount to encouragement or assistance of criminal activity are expressly not criminalised in this text.

Contrary to what I suspect the Minister may be about to say in response, this proposal is timely now, despite the Government’s ongoing appeal against the High Court judgment that ruled the terrorist proscription of Palestine Action to be disproportionate. In fact, the pending appeal makes it all the more timely. This amendment does not affect that appeal itself. It makes no comment on the wisdom or otherwise of the Government's assessment that Palestine Action had met the terrorism threshold after its five-year-long campaign of criminal damage and occasional use of violence.

If passed, however, this proposal would allow Ministers to seek parliamentary approval through a positive statutory instrument to restrict the activities of a future criminal group that held the purpose, which is the strategic intent, and the practice, which is the track record, of using criminal damage for political purposes like Palestine Action did. That is another way, in specifying purpose and practice, that the amendment has been tightened from the text debated in Committee. Thus, it would allow action in a future scenario to be taken much sooner before the group had met the terrorism threshold. The penalties applied for offences would be lower: up to three years’ imprisonment, rather than up to 14 years under the Terrorism Act. It would not criminalise expressions of support, as I have said, and it would avoid those convicted being saddled with an offence under the Terrorism Act for the rest of their lives.

If the Government’s appeal against the Palestine Action ruling is unsuccessful, this would provide an alternative to deter the group’s malign activities should those activities be resumed once proscription was lifted. That is just one of the reasons why the House should not take the advice, which I suspect the Minister is about to give, not to accept this amendment and wait instead for the outcome of the review by the noble Lord, Lord Macdonald of River Glaven, and then inevitably push this issue down the road for the next crime or public order Bill perhaps years hence. We all look forward to hearing the noble Lord’s views, but the Government themselves are not waiting for his view when they want to take swift action in other areas, such as on the cumulative impact caused by protests.

I hope, by the way, that the Minister will also accept my Amendment 377A to extend the cumulative impact provisions that he has laid applying to Sections 12 and 14 of the Public Order Act to Section 13, thus giving the police the power to recommend that a march does not go ahead on a particular day if the cumulative impact is sufficiently severe.

To go back to Amendment 371A, there have of course been many reviews in this territory, including my own when I served as the Government’s independent adviser on political violence and disruption. That review made the recommendation on extreme criminal protest groups that is encapsulated in Amendment 371A when it was published in May 2024, nearly two years ago. This is an appropriate time to act. It is an appropriately limited measure that can make a significant difference while completely preserving the right to protest and freedom of expression and association.

18:30

There are a range of views in this House, and, of course, in the country, over the proscription of Palestine Action. Whether it was right or wrong, it is undeniable that the measure and its impact have been divisive and controversial. The sight of people being arrested and charged for holding up signs is uncomfortable, whether or not you blame the law, the police or the protesters themselves. While there is a legal basis for the serious economic damage encapsulated in the definition of terrorism in the 2000 Act, I hazard that there is not great public support or understanding for branding as terrorists those whose methods are largely limited to the intimidation that comes from criminal damage.

Even though I am one of those who supported the proscription and continue to hope that the Government’s appeal will be successful, there would, however, be far wider support for a mechanism such as this that inhibits such a group from impacting the lives of working people and the public through this sustained campaign of criminal damage. No matter what the legitimacy of the progressive cause itself, this would enable us to stop the lives of working people and the public being ruined by restricting the ability of individuals to fund-raise, recruit and organise for such a group—and even, of course, as we have seen before Palestine Action was proscribed, to broadcast those crimes proudly on social media. I very much hope that noble Lords will support Amendment 371A today.

Amendment 371B (to Amendment 371A)

Moved by

[Lord Davies of Gower]

371B: In subsection (1), leave out paragraphs (a) to (c) and insert “Condition 1 has been met and that one of either—
(a) Condition 2, or(b) Condition 3,has been met.(1A) Condition 1 is that the group has as its purpose and practice the deliberate commission of one or more of the following offences—(a) an offence under section 1 of the Public Order Act 1986 (riot),(b) an offence under section 2 of the Public Order Act 1986 (violent disorder),(b) an offence under section 1 of the Criminal Damage Act 1971 (destroying or damaging property), or(d) an offence under section 7 of the Public Order Act 2023 (interference with the use or operation of key national infrastructure).(1B) Condition 2 is that the offences mentioned in Condition 1 are carried out with the intention of influencing public policy, parliamentary debate, ministerial decision-making or the exercise of democratic functions.(1C) Condition 3 is that the activities of the group create a risk of serious harm to public safety, democratic institutions, or the rights of others.”

[Lord Davies of Gower (Con)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Walney, for bringing forward Amendment 371A and all noble Lords who have added their name to it. I thank the Members of your Lordships’ House who, I hope, will be speaking to it. This amendment is eminently sensible. We have heard several examples already of groups which engage in criminal and intimidating behaviour to further their ideological ends, but which do not necessarily pass the terrorism threshold. There is no justification for their continued lawful existence, but to proscribe them as terrorists obfuscates the meaning of the category and incorporates inactive supporters within the definition. The pertinent example of this is Palestine Action. I will not speculate on whether the behaviour actually amounts to terrorism, but the actions of its supporters following its proscription highlight the necessity for action.

An organisation that damages defence infrastructure and attacks members of the public should cease to exist, but for the police to then have to spend precious time arresting hundreds of protesters with placards is clearly not ideal. It may seem morally dubious on behalf of those protesters, but I think we can all agree that they are a far cry from the archetypal terrorist supporters of, say, ISIS or the Taliban. Most importantly, it is a waste of police time to have to deal with sanctimonious protesters who otherwise peacefully support a general ideological cause. That is why we entirely support the noble Lord’s amendment. Our Amendment 371B introduces a minor change to the drafting that reflects our belief that the proscription of groups in this category should not be contingent on whether they fulfil the criteria of both subsections (1A) and (1B). Individually, the actions in both subsections should merit a protest group being proscribed and prohibited from taking further action.

If a listed crime is committed that creates a serious risk to the safety of the public, then the line is crossed from dissent to danger. I think noble Lords can agree that whether a group is for an ideological end or not, this should merit proscription. The very act of a group entering an arms factory with sledgehammers should preclude its existence, regardless of motive. That said, ideological motive is also a factor that should be considered in its own right: if a group shuns peaceful protest and becomes willing to commit criminal offences to further a political end, that should be grounds to ban it. Take, for example, BASH BACK, the activist group which has consistently engaged in criminal damage, vandalism and intimidation in the name of so-called transgender rights. To take one example—as I am sure my noble friend Lady Cash will highlight—it recently spray-painted the office building of the Equality and Human Rights Commission for simply declaring that biological sex is biological sex.

This vandalism is an offence under Section 1 of the Criminal Damage Act 1971 and should result in a group being proscribed. I am, however, wary that spray painting and other forms of vandalism may not be seen to create a risk of serious harm to public safety, and I am not confident that, with the right lawyers, the actions of these groups would result in them being proscribed, because of a technicality. Criminality alone introduces the possibility of restricting the practice of a protest group. Whether this is augmented by either a risk to public safety or by an intention to influence political decision-making should confirm that decision.

That being said, I reaffirm my support for the noble Lord’s original amendment. It is a pertinent time for this debate, and I believe that Amendment 371A finds the right balance between prohibiting criminal activity and permitting peaceful support. I hope all Members of your Lordships’ House can recognise the rationale for moving away from a rigid binary between terrorism and protest and acknowledge that it is a spectrum that will benefit from more nuance. His Majesty’s loyal Opposition will support this amendment, and I look forward to hearing the closing remarks of the Minister and of the noble Lord, Lord Walney.

[Lord Pannick (CB)]

My Lords, I have added my name to Amendment 371A from the noble Lord, Lord Walney. As the noble Lord mentioned, the House will be very familiar with the problems that have arisen from the use of the power that the Secretary of State has to proscribe a terrorist group. The virtue of Amendment 371A is that it avoids any such description. It focuses on the severe mischief that we know certain groups are causing in our society.

Who could object to the Secretary of State having a power, by regulation, to designate a group as an extreme criminal protest group if there is a reasonable belief that its purpose and practice is the deliberate commission of the serious offences set out in this amendment: riot, violent disorder, destroying or damaging property, and interference with the use or operation of key national infrastructure? Surely the Secretary of State should have power to take action, particularly when, as the amendment requires, those offences are carried out with the intention of influencing public policy, parliamentary debate, ministerial decision-making or the exercise of democratic functions, and they create a risk of serious harm to public safety, democratic institutions or the rights of others.

We all support the right to protest, but there are limits, and these clearly are breached by deliberate conduct the purpose of which is to act in the way set out in the tightly drawn amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Walney. As he has pointed out, he has avoided in his drafting the real problem that has arisen in the Palestine Action case: that people are criminalised by reason of support for that body. That has caused problems. The Court of Appeal case is pending, but this amendment avoids those difficulties.

So I support this. I hope the Minister will not tell the House that this is not the time and that we should wait in particular for the report of the noble Lord, Lord Macdonald of River Glaven. I too have the highest regard for him, but we should bear in mind that, with this Bill, the Government have not waited for his report in a number of provisions relating to public order, particularly and rightly on cumulative disruption. So I say to the House: let us deal with this. This is a legislative opportunity; it is a pressing problem, and we should deal with it now.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

My Lords, for the reasons given by the noble Lords, Lord Walney and Lord Pannick, I strongly support this amendment.

[Lord Goodman of Wycombe (Con)]

My Lords, I will speak to my Amendment 419. It is rare for an amendment to succeed before it has even been moved, but so it appears to be in the case of this amendment, which would compel the Government to publish a counterextremism strategy. In Committee, I tabled a similar amendment, to which the Minister gave what was, in essence, a holding reply. I then obtained a Question for Short Debate on the same subject, to which the Minister again gave a holding reply. But it is third time lucky, for today, on the very day of this debate, the Government have published a counterextremism strategy—or rather a cohesion strategy of which counterextremism is a part—which I believe is being announced in the other place as I speak. So the timing appears to show, if nothing else, the power of your Lordships’ House. In saying so, I make no complaint: for the Government to publish a strategy at all is at least a start. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, and the noble Lords, Lord Mendelsohn and Lord Walney, who co-signed this amendment, as well as the Liberal Democrat Front Bench, our own Front Bench and other noble Lords who spoke in Committee.

The strategy will be carefully studied during the weeks ahead, and it is worth reiterating at the start the point that only part of it concerns counterextremism. It appears to contain, as one might expect, the good, the not quite so good and the indifferent. The good, for example, includes further action to bar preachers from abroad who incite violence in mosques. The not so good includes, to give the same kind of example, no specific action that I can see against preachers in this country who incite violence in mosques—I draw the attention of those who doubt this happens to the evidence regularly published on X by the activist, habibi.

As for the indifferent, there is the proposed special representative for anti-Muslim hostility. Some wanted a fully-fledged definition of “Islamophobia” claiming a basis in racism. Others wanted no definition at all. What we have is a halfway house, and I suspect it will satisfy no one. On the one hand, initiatives with faith communities, such as Inter Faith Week, are welcome—assuming that the Government and others know whom they are engaging with, funding or giving platforms to—and, on the other, plans to crack down on hate crimes, in the strategy’s own words, are problematic. The distinction between inciting violence and defending free speech is difficult to draw, but it is vital.

But on balance I want to, in the words of the old song, accentuate the positive and eliminate the negative. It is welcome that the strategy confirms the last Government’s definition of “extremism”, which, though not perfect, identifies its core characteristic: ideologies that aim to

“undermine, overturn or replace the UK’s system of liberal parliamentary democracy and democratic rights”.

It is also welcome that the strategy recognises clearly and unequivocally that, although Islamist extremism is very far from being the only challenge of this kind, it is the predominant form, responsible for three-quarters of the workload of Contest and 94% of all terror-related deaths in the past 25 years. The challenges we must confront are terrorism at worst and balkanisation at best, with our United Kingdom divided up in living practice, if not constitutional fact, into ethnic and religious enclaves. The precedent of Northern Ireland during the Troubles is not encouraging, and I am sure that none of us want to see that.

So, if the strategy is to work, much will hinge on a single word: implementation. Can the Government see the best of it through? If the strategy is to be coherent—applied to out-of-school settings, schools, universities, the NHS, prisons, police, charities, civil society and government itself—three essentials are required. The first is clarity, authority, and strength at the centre. The way our governmental system works, for better or worse, is that, until or unless No. 10 wants something to happen, it will not happen, and even then it may not. The strategy proposes a new interministerial working group and regular reporting to the Prime Minister. This is an admirable aim, but I fear it will not cut the mustard. What is required, rather, is a Cabinet Minister—the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster or perhaps the Deputy Prime Minister—who is charged with responsibility for delivering the strategy and who speaks and acts with the Prime Minister’s authority. I regret, in passing, the apparent non-replacement of Robin Simcox as the Commissioner for Countering Extremism.

Secondly, the strategy needs to work not only at the centre of government but throughout the country, in civil society and local communities. The closer the state is to local communities, the easier it is, in pursuit of a quiet life, to engage with, fund and work with extremists. If noble Lords want an example, they need look no further than the horrifying recent developments in Birmingham, where the West Midlands Police bowed to an extremist mob over a football game, conjured up evidence that does not exist to justify its decision and then, in the words of Nick Timothy, “lied and lied again” about its actions, including to Parliament. Three of the eight mosques that the West Midlands Police consulted over its decision had hosted preachers who promoted conspiracy theories or called for the death of Jews. I am a localist by temperament, but I suspect that Westminster and Whitehall will need strong powers of intervention.

18:45

Finally, national government, the public sector and local government will require a level of political and religious literacy that does not necessarily come easily, and it is again welcome that the strategy recognises this fact. If, for example, members of a crowd begin to chant during a demonstration, “Khaybar, Khaybar, ya yahud. Jaish Muhammad soufa ya’oud”, local police need to understand what the chant means and the threat it makes. Most of us do not speak Arabic, are not Muslims, do not study political thought, may have no sympathy with religion in any event, and may simply and mistakenly identify Islam the ancient faith with Islamism the modern ideology.

The Islamists and the far right have a common interest in presenting Islamism falsely as the historical and living mainstream worldwide. The far right do it to target Muslims; the Islamists do it to recruit their children. Religious solutions to that last challenge lie in the hands of the traditional classical Islam, not the state. But government must at least know whom it is dealing with, act accordingly, protect members of all faiths and none, and actively work for the one-nation ideal. The strategy offers at least a glimpse of it, so I will not, when the time comes, seek to test the opinion of the House on my amendment. I welcome the strategy’s publication, but now the real work begins.

[Lord Goldsmith (Lab)]

My Lords, I put my name to Amendment 371A, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Walney, and I will say a word about it, because it is a bit of an unusual event for me to do that. But I will take also this opportunity to say something about the amendment to that amendment proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Gower.

I have, in essence, two reasons for supporting the amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Walney. Obviously, he did it from a position of great knowledge and experience in these areas, and I therefore take what he says and proposes very seriously. The first reason is that he is suggesting that particular conduct should be illegal—and can it be doubted that it should be? The constituent elements of this would be serious crime being promoted deliberately for the purpose of persuading of a particular political point of view; activities that create a “risk of serious harm” to public safety, democratic institutions or the rights of others; and that it should be for Parliament, on the application of the Secretary of State, to determine whether a particular group satisfies those requirements. That makes it, in my view, right for it to be unlawful, without having to go through the difficulties—referred to already by noble Lords—of proscribing an organisation as terrorist. I am not expressing any view on that; I actually supported what the Government did, but it is now for the courts to make their determinations, and I do not want to say anything that might suggest otherwise.

This amendment, if it were the law, would make it very clear that, in a limited category of case, where these requirements are met, it would be undoubtedly illegal without having to have issues. There are safeguards there: Parliament has to be involved in that. Secondly, it is clear that it is not proscription as terrorism: that is stated clearly in the amendment. Thirdly, all these elements need to be satisfied. That is why I come back to Amendment 371B from the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Gower. I do not support that because it would have the effect of diluting the requirements by making it possible for this to be an offence, even though one of the conditions described in his amendment as conditions 2 and 3 was not met. So, for example, it would mean that, even though the activities do not create a risk of serious harm to public safety, democratic institutions or the rights of others, it would be an offence. That goes too far for me, which is why I would not support his Amendment 371A.

The other issue that will be raised—I am sure that it will be raised by my noble friend the Minister, whom I thank for seeing me, too, to discuss the amendment—is the timing. I, too, have great respect for the noble Lord, Lord Macdonald of River Glaven; he and I worked very closely together when we were in government, when he was the Director of Public Prosecutions, and I look forward very much to what he has to say. But I am troubled. It will take some time, and there will then have to be a decision by government as to whether it accepts the recommendations. There will then need to be legislative time—and one thing I remember very well from government is the issue of finding legislative time. We have a vehicle here. If this is the right thing to do, this is a moment when it can be done. That is why I regret to say to my noble friend that I support this amendment and I have added my name to it.

[Baroness Deech (CB)]

My Lords, I have added my name to Amendment 419 in support of the noble Lord, Lord Goodman, and the other signatories. It calls for a counterextremism strategy to be published annually. I am also in support of the gist of all the amendments in this group, which are trying to plug the gap in the law exposed by the unwillingness to follow through on the proscription of Palestine Action, in so far as its supporters may be labelled terrorists, but recognises that the activists are carrying out acts of terror, as the court said, that damage the public and our infrastructure.

The Government will no doubt say that they have a strategy, newly issued as Protecting What Matters. At a time of tension, starting long before the current war with Iran but exacerbated by it, the Government have to confront real threats, exemplified, inter alia, by the arrest of four men suspected of working for Iran and being involved in threats to the safety of our community. There have been more than a dozen Iranian-backed attempts at kidnap and murder of our citizens in the last few years, with no doubt more to come. We are talking about matters of life and death.

The Government’s report allegedly identifies Islamist extremism as responsible for most of the terror-related deaths in the past 25 years—and it is good to see the Government saying what is sometimes deemed unspeakable. The Government are also right to resist any attempt to introduce a blasphemy law into Britain. We recall the innocent Batley grammar school teacher still in hiding, simply because he was being a professional teacher. Fortunately, Hamit Coskun was acquitted after burning a Koran: a nasty act, but not one deserving of special punishment. We remain committed to freedom of speech, no matter how rude, and it is not to be silenced by others who find it offensive in their view.

However, I see some blurring of responsibility in the Government’s document, as I saw it reported, when it comes to tackling Islamism. What is the difference between that ideology and Islam in general? Is there not a sliding scale from, at the extreme end, wanting to cover the country with sharia law at the expense of secular law, and at the other going on to be more motivated by what one’s religion might demand, supposedly, than by the law of the land? Continuing on the blurring theme, if the Government’s strategy requires the appointment of an anti-Muslim hostility tsar, this is moving away from equal treatment and leaving the door ajar for unquestioned extremism. The definition of anti-Muslim hatred takes us into the realm of policing offence and dilutes the need to call out extremism and danger if perceived. If divisive content is to be regulated, who determines that, save the noise and outrage from those who feel they are being attacked, again risking muzzling dissent and free speech?

The government report, I fear, is inadequate in protecting the Jewish community. Jews do not count. We number precisely 0.4% of the population. But Jews, young and old, are under threat and confront hatred every day in the streets, in schools, in hospitals, in the arts and online. I welcome the Government’s decision to set up a commission to inquire into antisemitism in schools, but it is slow. Antisemitism today is disguised as anti-Zionism, as the late Lord Sachs pointed out. We see right through that. There is no hatred based on, say, China’s treatment of minorities, or Russia’s, or African states’ treatment of Christians. Jews are singled out. The policing of hate marches and vandalism in the name of politics must be strengthened, and it is not going too far to say that the Jewish community’s trust in the police and the BBC is faltering. The law must set out police powers in this respect, and vandalism, even in the name of politics, must be severely punished. To see the statue of Churchill defaced tells you all you need to know about countering extremism. How much worse it will be if ever there is a start on building a huge, brutal Holocaust memorial next to Parliament.

There is more complication to come. It is reported that the noble Lord, Lord Walney, who deserves the utmost admiration of this House in his standing up to terror and extremism and the defence of our values and freedom, is to issue a report, Undue Influence, which blows the Government’s document out of the water. The noble Lord allegedly reports that there are 30 or so charities linked to Iran that maintain influence here and plot attacks against dissidents and the Jewish community. Some of them are already under the too-slow investigation of the Charity Commission, though it is not its fault, which has called for greater powers. Most chillingly, the noble Lord suggests that there is a reluctance to call them out for fear of being labelled Islamophobic, a fear that might only become worse if the Government’s strategy of tackling what they see as Muslim hatred is put into place. That would muffle still further any attempt to expose what might be going on by way of extreme risk.

On the one hand, the noble Lord, Lord Walney, warns that fear of being labelled racist has stultified the tackling of Iran-linked organisations, while, on the other hand, the Government want the anti-Muslim hatred tsar to protect Muslims from hate and discrimination. The noble Lord calls for more assertive regulation, but the Government want a cohesion strategy that plays down the danger and reassures Muslim communities. The Government’s proposals, as I read them, would increase the fear of being labelled racist or Islamophobic. It would make regulators more cautious and be weaponised by hostile activists to deflect attention away from their plans. The Government’s tsar must be completely limited, if it comes about, to hate crime: regulation should disregard religion and focus on criminal behaviour. A line must be drawn between domestic problems and the influence of Iran and other hostile states. Criticism must not be silenced.

In considering its balancing act, the Government must weigh, on the one hand, the atrocities committed by Islamists in, inter alia, the Manchester Arena, London Bridge, Westminster Bridge, the Underground, the Lee Rigby murder, Glasgow Airport, Heaton Park—and there are other incidents—and the risk, on the other hand, of not allowing the identification of further such calamities for fear of Islamophobia. The Government need to draw up a new strategy that protects Muslims at home from discrimination but does not create an atmosphere that allows hostile organisations to cry Islamophobia when their activities are under scrutiny for fear of terrorism. It is a difficult task, which is why the noble Lord, Lord Goodman, and I and the other signatories of this amendment are asking the Government to accept this amendment and move forward.

19:00

[Lord Hogan-Howe (CB)]

My Lords, I have added my name to Amendment 371A from the noble Lord, Lord Walney, because it addresses a difficult area—something that falls short of terrorism and which causes problems for legislators, policing and the courts. Terrorism is fairly well understood. It is the application or the threat of violence for a political purpose; it is easily stated. In this case, it seems to me that there are some indications that there might be a gap. It is not the first time we have been confronted by this problem. Before terrorism was defined—probably by the terrorism which started in Northern Ireland—in the 1930s, we saw that people were parading on the streets for political motives, so legislation had to be introduced on uniforms and various other things that indicated that people were trying to use violence or political aspirations to influence the Government.

It seems that the gap that has evolved is around Palestine Action. There are probably three indicators of a need for a solution to a gap that has developed. First, we have had a criminal case in which a police officer was hit by someone with a hammer, and the people who appeared to have been involved have been found not guilty. That case has been appealed, but that one issue has obviously caused some concern for everybody affected—the police, in part, but mainly the businesses being attacked by this group. The second case is a civil case, which is already—

[Lord Pannick (CB)]

May I just correct the noble Lord? In that case, what happened was that the jury could not agree and there is a retrial of those serious criminal allegations.

[Lord Hogan-Howe (CB)]

That is quite right, and thank you for that correction, although, clearly, they were not found guilty.

Secondly, the civil case is about prohibition. The High Court has decided that it does not prefer the Government’s judgment that Palestine Action should be a proscribed group. I find that constitutionally quite odd. I understand that sometimes, the court will come to a different opinion on legislation, but it seems to me that the Government, faced with the best information possible, have concluded that it should be proscribed, and the court has decided that that is not proportionate. Whatever the outcome on appeal—which the noble Lord, Lord Walney, has alluded to and we will hear eventually—this needs to be resolved quickly because it is hard to understand.

Both cases might indicate that there were some doubts about the proscription of this group. Most of the time, terrorist groups are obvious. Terrorism is mass and indiscriminate violence that murders tens of people. We see it and it is very obvious. In this case I did wonder, but sometimes governments have information that the rest of us do not. One of the other signs, which has already been mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Walney, was that, when support began to be expressed for a proscribed group, people then said, “This is quite odd; why are we arresting them?” They did not have the same qualms about Irish terrorism or about ISIS when they were beheading citizens of this country. It indicates that, perhaps, there is something different about this group. The amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Walney, has identified a reasonable solution to that gap. Conspiracy alone is not a sufficient answer. It is possible to charge someone with conspiracy to commit a violent act or conspiracy to riot, but you cannot prosecute people who might fund that conspiracy. This amendment would start to address the protest group and the way it is funded and supported.

My final point—quite narrowly defined in this sense—is that this is about the intent to cause serious harm to public safety or to affect public policy and democracy. Both are substantial bars to pass before somebody could be convicted of this offence. The Government ought seriously to consider filling the gap with this amendment, or, if they do not, with something very much like it.

[Lord Polak (Con)]

My Lords, I support Amendments 371A, 419 and 441B, to which I have added my name. It is clear that attacking a police officer with a sledgehammer or breaking into an RAF base and damaging two planes, causing £7 million-worth of damage, is not a peaceful protest. Amendment 371A rightly targets that grey area between ordinary protest groups and groups that cross the threshold to be proscribed under terrorism law. These are groups whose purpose and practice involves the deliberate commission of criminal damage, riot, violent disorder and interference with national infrastructure.

When groups are legislated against, often, splinter groups form and these groups are left to fester. Amendment 371A would give greater power to the Secretary of State to deal with extremism at its root, rather than waiting for it to grow and meet the terrorist threshold. By this point, it becomes too late and the harms, which are sometimes irreparable, may have already occurred. Responsible governance means intervening before that point is reached. For those reasons, I support this amendment. I also pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Goodman, for his tenacity and I support his amendment.

Often, our approach has been far too reactive, notwithstanding the announcement being made in the other place. As the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, said, the Jewish community in this country knows all too well how rhetoric and ideological radicalisation can create a climate of fear. Between 2024 and 2025, at least 10 and probably more terrorism cases against British Jews or UK-based Israeli interests were uncovered. These plots were foiled thanks to the extraordinary work of the counterterrorism police and the Community Security Trust.

We have created an environment where extremism is allowed to grow unchallenged. Are we just going to wait until there is another attack on a synagogue or a credible plot against a Jewish school? At that point, it is too late. The amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Goodman, recognises that extremism rarely appears suddenly; it develops gradually through networks, narratives and campaigns that legitimise hostility. Left unchallenged, these dynamics can become embedded in communities and online spaces, creating an environment where more serious forms of criminality or even terrorism become more likely. Amendment 419 is about ensuring that our response to extremism is enduring, co-ordinated and strategic. Above all, it is about ensuring that the Government are equipped with the tools and the institutional framework necessary to address extremism before it escalates into violence.

Finally, Amendment 441B in this group, in my name and that of the noble Lord, Lord Walney, and the noble Baroness, Lady Foster, seeks to ensure that organisations which promote or support criminal conduct or which attempt to subvert the constitutional integrity or democratic institutions of the United Kingdom are prohibited from receiving public funds. Such a safeguard is well overdue. It would ensure that taxpayers’ money cannot, whether deliberately or inadvertently, support organisations whose activities threaten public safety or the foundations of our democracy. Public funds should strengthen society, not subsidise those who seek to destabilise it.

It remains far too difficult to challenge organisations that continue to receive public support despite clear evidence that their leaders promote extremist ideologies, including those who openly aspire to replace democratic governments with a religious caliphate. This loophole allows public money to reach bodies fundamentally at odds with our democratic principles. This amendment would close that unacceptable gap. It would protect public funds from misuse and send an unequivocal message that any attempt to undermine the democratic institutions of the United Kingdom should not and will not be tolerated.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lords, Lord Walney, Lord Pannick and Lord Hogan-Howe, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Goldsmith, for listening in Committee. Reservations were raised, and it is refreshing and unusual to have an amendment brought back that tries to take into account some of the issues that were raised in good faith. The fact that the amendment has now been posed as not unduly undermining freedom of speech or association and does not criminalise expressions of support is very useful. That it is so much narrower in scope makes it much more something I support—not that everyone has been waiting for that point, but none the less.

More seriously, the pre-proscription point is really important. My dread is that what has happened with Palestine Action, without getting into the court case, has discredited what proscription is about and watered down what people think terrorism is. These much more granular attempts at making distinctions are so important.

However, we need to acknowledge the dangers in what we mean by “extremism” in relation to this whole group of amendments, especially today, when the Government’s pronouncements on anti-extremism are coming out. We should acknowledge that those who hold the pen on any legal definition of extremism acquire extraordinary powers to curtail free speech, criminalise people and so on. It makes this a difficult issue. In a democratic, pluralist society there is invariably a wide range of beliefs and opinions that can be dubbed extremist. That means we have some potholes to negotiate, as it can lead to partisan, subjective or political labelling of dissenting views that can be dubbed extremist.

I raise that because it is not straightforward. We might think that we all know what we mean by “extremist”. I have agreed with all the examples I have heard today—I have thought, “I don’t like them either—I’ll dub them extremist”. The problem is when it is used a bit more promiscuously. If the definition is “something that completely undermines democratic norms and values”, up until recently I would have thought that anyone attacking the democratic norm of the key legal protection traditionally afforded to due process, which has gone on for hundreds of years, was an extremist, but now we have a Government pushing to abolish jury trials and I am meant to accept it as straightforward.

[Lord Goldsmith (Lab)]

I thank the noble Baroness for recognising what has been done in this amendment, but it does not actually talk about extremism. It talks about “extreme criminal protest groups”. It may reassure her that the definition does not depend on the views being put forward being extremist but the actions and particular conduct—riot and so forth. I offer that to reassure her on the point she is making, which otherwise I am listening to very carefully.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

I thank the noble and learned Lord for that clarity. That is true for that amendment. I was going on to talk about why I am sympathetic to Amendment 419, which calls on the Government to publish a counterextremism strategy, while recognising that, when we do so, we must acknowledge that this is a difficult area. Amendment 371A has carefully avoided being about views and opinions, but not all the amendments in this group do. We have to be very careful when we talk about extremism.

On Amendment 419, one should congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Goodman of Wycombe, on his persistence, as has been said. I like the amendment because it calls for a review to be published annually. The announcement today that there is a strategy does not make this amendment irrelevant, because we need to carry on updating and looking carefully at what we mean by this. Laying that before Parliament seems important. On the pre-emption of the new social cohesion document, Protecting What Matters, it is certainly being posed as an anti-extremism strategy but is likely to get into all sorts of difficulties precisely because of this uncertainty about what we mean by extremism, beyond the controversy over the special representative on anti-Muslim hostility.

The noble Baroness, Lady Deech, has talked about the difficulties there. I am very anxious about it. I have been contacted since the announcement by people working on the grooming gangs who are worried that they would not be able to raise the issue with this definition—even though they are not quite sure what it is yet, so fair enough—as well as academics working on cousin marriage and so on. There has been some enthusiasm in certain quarters, saying that we should now name and shame all the media organisations dominated by anti-Muslim hatred. You can already see supporters of this new definition, such as it is, gearing up to start pointing fingers and they have started naming names. It is fair enough, but with this leaked document saying that national symbols such as the union flag can be a tool of hate used to intimidate and exclude, that it is an extremist symbol and so on, you can see why people would be anxious.

19:15

Apparently, in the document we are asking universities to manage external speakers to ensure that we keep out extremists. I am not sure I want university managers, who tend to be on the progressive side, deciding who the extremists are—especially on a day when we have just heard that 27 UK university Islamic societies, including at UCL, Imperial, Bristol, Leeds, Warwick, Cambridge and all sorts of places, have had memorials to Iran’s Supreme Leader. It is not the external speakers, but what is happening in the universities. We think about Professor Michael Ben-Gad, an economics lecturer who has been called an extremist by his own students because he was in the IDF, and been threatened with beheading, or the Jewish chaplain at the University of Leeds whose wife and two children, only a couple of years ago, were forced into hiding. The university authorities let all that happen.

I am simply raising the point that, although the strategy is out and we have a group of amendments where we all think we know what we mean by extremism, it is not that easy and this strategy will not solve all the problems. Therefore, I support the call for an annual discussion of where we are at with extremism; we should be having a much more open and full discussion, not just in Parliament but with the public, rather than treating them as the problem—the extremists, who need to be managed and policed—about the problems we are trying to solve.

[Baroness Verma (Con)]

My Lords, I support my noble friend Lord Goodman and the noble Lord, Lord Walney, but I would also like to see highlighted in any reports coming forward the increasing attacks on Hindu and Sikh communities. They are not being reported widely, but unfortunately they are on the increase, and we are having worrying discussions internally on how to deal with them.

[Lord Young of Acton (Con)]

My Lords, I declare my interest as director of the Free Speech Union. I too share the reservations of the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, about the Government’s decision today to publish an official definition of anti-Muslim hostility and to appoint a tsar to ensure that it is observed. There are already adequate protections in the law for people of all faiths; I am thinking in particular of the proscription of the stirring up of religious hatred in the Public Order Act 1986 and the proscription of discrimination by employers on religious grounds of employees, applicants to jobs or service providers.

I am not persuaded that Muslims need particular protections over and above those that all faith groups are granted under the law. I am not convinced that in a city such as Leicester, for instance, publishing a definition of anti-Muslim hostility but not anti-Hindu hostility will allay rather than exacerbate community tensions. I hope there will be an opportunity for your Lordships’ House to opine on the entire action plan unveiled today when the House discusses the Statement in due course.

I do, however, support the amendment 371A from the noble Lord, Lord Walney. There are some extreme criminal protest groups who do not deserve the kind of free speech protections that other groups deserve, precisely because they use their free speech and right to protest to bully, intimidate and threaten those they seek to silence.

The Free Speech Union was itself the victim of an extreme criminal protest group that my noble friend referred to while speaking to this amendment and the supplementary amendment: Bash Back. It stole some data from the Free Speech Union’s website in a cyber attack, including the details of some small donors, some of whom had donated to some extremely sensitive crowdfunding campaigns in the expectation that they were doing so privately. That data, however, was stolen and published on Bash Back’s website. That was designed not only to silence those with whom it disagrees but to intimidate, bully and threaten an organisation that is simply defending the right to speak of those that Bash Back disagrees with.

Therefore, I think there are circumstances in which the Home Secretary should have the power to designate and proscribe certain extreme criminal protest groups. This more nuanced measure, particularly with the supplementary amendment, is a more attractive alternative to the present arrangement. In addition to defending a wide variety of people who have not broken the law, the Free Speech Union is currently engaged in defending a Palestine Action protester who was arrested and has been charged just for expressing support for Palestine Action by holding up a sign saying, “I support Palestine Action”. It is very difficult to defend the prosecution of people who merely express support for what I would think of as an extreme criminal protest group, not a terrorist group.

I therefore urge your Lordships to support the amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Walney, as it creates a degree of nuance, and I believe that proscribing groups that deserve to be proscribed without also making it a criminal offence to express support for those groups is a welcome compromise.

[Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)]

My Lords, despite having some hesitation about it, we are broadly support of Amendment 371A from the noble Lord, Lord Walney. The concept of the new category of extreme criminal protest groups that are not proscribed has real merit and is plainly an attempt to plug an uncomfortable gap. We agree with the noble Lord, Lord Walney, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Goldsmith, that unlawfulness is at the heart of this amendment. The amendment states that the group must have

“as its purpose and practice the deliberate commission of”

one of a series of serious offences, and that

“such offences are carried out with the intention of influencing public policy, parliamentary debate, ministerial decision-making, or the exercise of democratic functions”,

and that,

“the activities … create a risk of serious harm to public safety, democratic institutions, or the rights of others”.

Those provisions make it clear that extreme criminal protest groups are well named. The provisions as a whole would also make it clear, however, that it is not appropriate for proscription of those groups whereby any support for the groups is made a criminal offence under the Terrorism Act.

If the amendment would avoid the prosecution of peaceful protesters for peaceable support of groups that could be branded terrorist under the Terrorist Act, we could support it unconditionally because there would then be a hierarchy of offences. At the top of the tree would be offences under the Terrorism Act, and then the treatment of groups which qualified as extreme criminal protest groups under the Walney amendment. But the Government have not committed and would not commit—and I do not suppose they will at this stage commit—to end prosecutions for peaceable protesters under the Terrorism Act. That may change after the Macdonald review, or it may change if the Government’s appeal against the High Court’s decision in relation to Palestine Action is unsuccessful. However, our position is that it would be helpful to have a middle course, as the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, pointed out in very sensible terms. The noble Baroness, Lady Fox, articulated the same point very well, but in a different way.

The problem we see with the amendment is that it does not affect the Terrorism Act, and there would remain the potential for prosecution of peaceful protesters under that Act as the law stands. So we have decided, with some hesitation, that it is probably sensible to await the Macdonald review. I accept that I am making that point in the face of the argument made by the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, that we should not be asking for any legislation along the lines of the Walney amendment to wait at all. Of course, there is the problem that not accepting this amendment would leave us with the limited choice of the Terrorism Act or nothing, and that is a very unfortunate position to be in.

We have some concerns about the drafting of the amendment, and they are not minimal. Under proposed subsection (3)(b),

“promotion of a designated ECPG, including public advocacy, recruitment, or dissemination of the group’s materials”

would be an offence. Would subsection (3)(b) cover handing out leaflets or carrying posters or flags in a peaceable way? In proposed subsection (3)(e),

“providing material support, training, funds or equipment to the group where the person knows or ought reasonably to know that the recipient is a designated ECPG”

suggests that the level of knowledge required is very low. What is material support? What would count as equipment? Would posters, flags or banners count as equipment? It would be considerably worrying if the answer to those questions was positive.

In sum, we are broadly supportive and believe that there should be a middle category, but we are concerned about the amendment as it stands. The Government should be seriously considering their position between now and Third Reading; they should listen to the very strong feeling in the House that something is needed in the way of a middle course that would prevent these prosecutions for peaceable protest and support under the Terrorism Act. They should then come back to the House at Third Reading with an amendment that could answer the criticisms and gain widespread support.

Finally, we have considerable sympathy with Amendment 419 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Goodman, which calls for the publication of a counterextremism strategy.

[Lord Davies of Gower (Con)]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have spoken in this debate. Noble Lords have spoken of the effects that these groups can have when they go unchecked, and I think that the whole House has benefited from listening to these anecdotes. We cannot stand for a society in which violent, insurrectionary behaviour is normalised. Groups such as Palestine Action or Bash Back should not be allowed to exist given their past actions, and this amendment provides for that. That said, their supporters are not advocates of general terrorist activities and, while they support morally dubious causes, requiring their arrest for standing outside with a placard is a monumental waste of police time.

For similar reasons, I also support Amendment 419, tabled by my noble friend Lord Goodman. His is a very simple amendment, which merely asks the Government to publish a counterextremism strategy, given the ever-increasing extent of political extremism and its encouragement in some quarters. Amendment 371A strikes a balance. It adds nuance to a category of offences that desperately needs it, and we wholly support its intent. I hope that the Minister will agree. I am happy to withdraw my Amendment 371B and, should the noble Lord, Lord Walney, wish to divide the House, we will support him.

Amendment 371B (to Amendment 371A) withdrawn.

19:30

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Lord Hanson of Flint) (Lab)]

A lot has been discussed this evening, and I will try to respond to the amendments as best I can. I welcome the fact that the noble Lord, Lord Walney, has moved his amendment. I had a chance to talk to him earlier online; he has arrived on time, and I am pleased he is here to move it. He has had support from across the House, including from the noble Lords, Lord Polak, Lord Pannick and, in part, Lord Davies, and my noble and learned friend Lord Goldsmith, and I thank him for his amendment. Other noble Lords and Baronesses have spoken in favour of the legislation, and I note the comments made by the noble Baronesses, Lady Deech and Lady Verma, and, in the context of this debate, the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe. I will come to the separate amendment tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Goodman of Wycombe, in due course.

The nub of the argument is that Amendment 371A shows that there is an impact of sustained criminal activity, including serious incidents involving damage to property, intimidation and risks to public safety, and it should be dealt with as an interim measure between proscription and criminal damage legislation as a whole. I outlined to the noble Lord, Lord Walney, in a recent letter that the Public Order Act 1986 grants police powers to manage protests by imposing conditions, and looks at those it is necessary to place on protests, including location, route and date. I also pointed out to the noble Lords, Lord Walney and Lord Pannick, and my noble and learned friend Lord Goldsmith, whom I also met today, that the noble Lord, Lord Macdonald of River Glaven, is currently undertaking an independent review of public order and hate crime legislation, which will cover whether existing legislation is effective and proportionate. I am pleased that the noble Lord, Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames, acknowledged that the review, which will report later in the spring, will discuss and give some potential framework to the existing legislation. Also, the Foreign Influence Registration Scheme, the action we have taken on Palestine Action under the 2000 Act, the work of Prevent and the protest legislation in the Bill are all measures that deal with similar issues to those the noble Lord, Lord Walney, has brought forward.

To come to the nub of the problem, which I hope noble Lords will accept, I understand that there are a range of views on the amendment, and I may find myself in a minority on this if it goes to a Division, which I hope it will not. When I look at the amendment itself, if there was such a tool as that proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Walney, below the threshold in the Terrorism Act 2000, it would not have stopped the Government proscribing Palestine Action under the 2000 Act. The assessment was made that Palestine Action passed the statutory test for proscription at that time. As noble Lords will be aware, although there is a Court of Appeal hearing on Palestine Action, the High Court agreed in its first consideration that Palestine Action had organised and undertaken actions amounting to terrorism. A case is pending that will be reviewed and the Government will have to respond to it in due course.

However, I would argue that, at present, we have the tools in existing public order and related legislation to tackle the type of criminality that the noble Lord, Lord Walney, mentioned. We are significantly upscaling our efforts on counterextremism as a whole. Groups that meet the Terrorism Act threshold, and individuals acting on their behalf or in support of them, will be dealt with under existing proscription powers. Where groups do not meet the threshold for proscription, we will continue to assess the activities of organisations against our legal frameworks and existing legislation. If there is evidence of purposeful actions that are potentially radicalising others into terrorism or violence, proportionate action will be taken. I have mentioned already things such as Prevent, the protest legislation and other measures. Again, the noble Lord, Lord Macdonald of River Glaven, will review those matters in due course.

To answer the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, and others, that the Government have brought forward legislation, we have commissioned the noble Lord, Lord Macdonald, to undertake a review, but the amendments we have brought forward are in response to urgent matters that we felt we needed to tackle. I have tabled those in relation to protest legislation to ensure that we manage difficult challenges by putting forward legislation on, for example, protests, marches and giving the police powers. I suggest to the noble Lords, Lord Walney and Lord Pannick, that it is something we should take our time to consider. The noble Lord, Lord Macdonald, is bringing forward his review shortly, in the spring. This amendment, whether in its original form or as amended by Amendment 371B put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Davies, effectively seeks to create a parallel regime to that in the Terrorism Act, which the Government believe is not necessary and risks unjustified interference with rights to free speech and freedom of association. The Government must be able to protect our citizens from the harm of extremism, violence and hatred but, in doing so, we must strike the right balance between protecting freedom of speech and tackling those who promote violence and hatred in our communities.

Amendment 441B, also tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Walney, concerns access to public funds for organisations promoting or supporting criminal conduct. Again, I say to him that the Government provide funding to a huge range of organisations through grant schemes administered by departments and arm’s-length bodies across government. Any grants of public funds are subject to Treasury guidance set out in Managing Public Money, which looks at risk, control and assurances that grant controllers are required to take into account. Is the legislative route required?

Today, and this goes to the heart of amendments from the noble Lord, Lord Goodman of Wycombe, we have published the social cohesion action plan. A number of comments have been made about the issues in the plan, including by the noble Baronesses, Lady Verma and Lady Deech, and the noble Lord, Lord Goodman of Wycombe. It was put on the website probably less than an hour ago and is many pages long. I simply ask that Members look at what is in it, its context and the things we are trying to challenge so that all communities, whatever their religion, can live their lives in freedom, and so that we have social cohesion in what is, and will remain, a multicultural society. The engagement principles will be updated so that public bodies do not confer legitimacy, funding or influence on extremist groups.

On Amendment 419, which would require the publication of a counterextremism strategy, the noble Lord said that he has raised it in Questions, in amendments in Committee and in Grand Committee in a special debate. We are looking at the issues he has raised; there will be further updates and reports on the matter, and I advise him to look at the social cohesion strategy—which, as I said, was produced within the past hour—in full.

Extremists often deliberately operate without meeting thresholds for criminal conduct and cannot be prosecuted for their actions. Despite this, this Government still have a responsibility to protect our citizens from the harm of extremism, violence and hatred. But in doing so, we still have to protect the balance between freedom of speech and tackling those who promote violence and hatred in our communities.

We have been very clear in our approach to counterterrorism and counterextremism. We have an overarching counterterrorism strategy, an approach that ensures counterextremism efforts are focused on the highest harm threats, in direct support of our core counterterrorism and wider security mission. The local social cohesion strategy, published by the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government in the past hour following a Statement in the House of Commons—which I suspect will be repeated here shortly—is trying to marry those things together to provide social cohesion. I hope that answers the points from the noble Lord, Lord Young of Acton, on those issues.

Finally, with Prevent, Contest and the definitions of extremism we have examined, set out by the previous Government in 2024, we believe there are strong mechanisms to tackle extremism while ensuring we support all members of our society. The noble Baroness, Lady Deech, said that Jews do not count. I say to her, genuinely, that everybody in society counts; everybody has a right to protection; and everybody has a right to live their lives free from persecution, harassment, terrorist activity and extremism. I felt genuinely sorry when she said that phrase. We are trying to support all members of our community, particularly the Jewish community. If she looks at the measures in the Bill, she will see they have been driven by allowing people to express their religion and for them not to be harassed or put into a box by people on marches and protests on a regular basis. That is what we are trying to do.

I understand where the noble Lord, Lord Walney, is coming from, but I wish for him to withdraw and not to push his amendment. We have a framework in place to deal with criminal activity and those organisations that cross the terrorism threshold, and to ensure through the social cohesion strategy that all members of our community have the right to live a free life in the United Kingdom.

[Lord Walney (CB)]

My Lords, this has been an excellent and thoughtful debate, and I have been touched by the kind words and expressions of support from nearly all sides of the House. I have listened carefully to what the Minister has said, and I hope he knows how much I respect the work that he and the Government do, but on this occasion I am not convinced by his central assertion that the framework exists and is working.

The Minister raised the issue of Palestine Action, as so many have done across the Chamber today. It is indeed looming large over this discussion. Whether or not you take the view that the Government were right in proscribing Palestine Action, the fact that it took five years of this organisation committing criminal damage in a sustained and organised way before it was deemed to have met the terrorism threshold—which is now obviously being challenged, and I hope the Government win on appeal—shows that there is a gap. This gap is not filled by the public order measures which are used to place conditions on marches, which the Minister has cited in response as to why the framework is working. That is a different thing.

I am really pleased—and it is really unusual—to get such a broad expression from, reductively, the Conservatives to the Liberal Democrat Benches on a difficult issue like this. It shows that it is proportionate. I quote in conclusion the words of the noble Lord, Lord Marks, back at him. He has—reluctantly, I would think—come to the view that he will abstain, but he made the point himself that not supporting this amendment leaves on the table a choice between the status quo of doing nothing, or full terrorism proscription. I really respect his view that he would like to see encouragement of proscribed terrorist organisations taken off. That is a complex question, but if I had opened that up in this amendment, the whole thing would probably have been subsumed.

Therefore, it is right that we push this particular narrow change to the legislation. The Government and the Minister’s concerns can be tightened up after this, when the Bill goes into ping-pong. Then, we can deal with the concerns of the noble Lord, Lord Marks, in the shortest order after that. With that all having been said, I would like to test the opinion of the House on this matter.

19:45

Division 3

Amendment 371A agreed.

Ayes: 200

Noes: 162

19:56

Schedule 14: Specified memorials

Amendment 372 not moved.

Amendments 372ZZA and 372ZZB

Moved by

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay]

372ZZA: Schedule 14, page 348, line 20, at end insert—
“24A Monument to the Women of World War II, Whitehall, London.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment adds the Monument to the Women of World War II to the list of war memorials in Part 1 of Schedule 14.

372ZZB: Schedule 14, page 348, line 27, at end insert—
“27 Holocaust Memorial Garden, Hyde Park, London.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment adds the Holocaust Memorial Garden to the list of memorials in Part 3 of Schedule 14.

Amendments 372ZZA and 372ZZB agreed.

Clause 139: Places of worship: restriction on protests

Amendments 372ZA to 372D not moved.

Clause 140: Public processions and assemblies: duty to take account of cumulative disruption

Amendment 373 not moved.

[Lord Katz (Lab)]

My Lords, this seems to be a convenient time to break for dinner break business. We will therefore not return to the Bill before 8.38 pm.

19:58

Consideration on Report adjourned until not before 8.38 pm.

Energy Markets

Monday 9th March 2026 Lords Chamber

Statement

19:59

The following Statement was made in the House of Commons on Thursday 5 March.

“With permission, I will make a Statement about the situation in energy markets in the light of the unfolding conflict in Iran and the Middle East. My thoughts are with the British citizens and those across the world affected by the events of recent days, and I thank members of our Armed Forces serving in the region and elsewhere.

Let me update the House on the situation in global oil and gas markets and the impact on the UK. In the days since the conflict began, we have seen Iran target energy production and export infrastructure across the Gulf. Traffic in the Strait of Hormuz, through which around 20% of global oil and liquefied natural gas is shipped, has declined very significantly, and the Iranian regime has issued reckless and unjustified threats to all ships using it. LNG production has also been halted in Qatar, following unjustified and indiscriminate Iranian attacks at the start of the week.

The UK benefits from strong and diverse energy supplies, including our own North Sea production, pipelines with Norway, interconnectors with continental Europe and three LNG terminals. While Qatar is a major supplier of LNG globally, last year it provided the UK with 1% of our gas supply. I have been in touch with National Gas and the National Energy System Operator, which are confident about our security of supply. On oil, we hold substantial emergency and commercial stocks and stand ready to work with the International Energy Agency to support the stability of oil markets if needed. As when Russia invaded Ukraine, though, we will be exposed to price competition in international oil and gas markets, which is pushing up wholesale prices as other countries seek to replace lost supplies from the region. That reflects our position, regardless of our domestic production, as a price taker not a price maker in these markets, leaving us exposed to their volatility, no matter where the fossil fuels come from.

The Government continue to monitor the situation closely and work with our international partners. In recent days I have had multiple conversations with the executive director of the IEA, as well as with my counterparts in Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the EU and our major UK oil and gas producers. I will be having further calls with our international allies and partners over the coming days. This is a fast-moving situation, and we continue to work with our allies to seek to minimise the impact of disruption to markets and support the safe passage of oil and gas across the world.

I know that families and businesses across the country will see these global events and be concerned about the impact on their energy bills and the cost of living. It is important to say that the energy price cap will provide protection for households until the start of July, regardless of developments in the Middle East. Last week, Ofgem confirmed that as a result of the Chancellor’s decisions in the Budget, the price cap will fall by 7%, or £117 annually, for the period covering April to June. The price cap for that period is fixed and will not change. That is a direct result of decisions in the Budget by my right honourable friend the Chancellor to raise taxes on the wealthiest, and to cut bills for families across Britain. In addition, around 6 million families are benefiting from our expansion of the £150 warm home discount, and we are delivering the biggest investment in home upgrades in British history through our warm homes plan, to cut bills and shield families from these kinds of fossil fuel shocks.

On business and industry, we are taking action to expand the British industry supercharger from April to reduce costs for the most energy-intensive businesses, and a significant proportion of businesses are on fixed-term contracts that shield them from market volatility for the contract duration. However, we recognise that at the point of contracting, businesses are exposed to international fossil fuel markets, and clearly, for both businesses and consumers, much will depend on the length of this crisis.

On Tuesday in her Spring Statement, my right honourable friend the Chancellor reaffirmed her commitment to prioritise families and businesses, whatever turbulence we see around the world. She showed her determination to act on bills in the Budget last year, and as we continue to monitor the effects of these events, the House and country should be in no doubt that the Prime Minister’s No. 1 priority is to tackle the cost of living crisis that affects families across Britain. However long this crisis lasts, we must learn the right long-term lessons. The events of recent days are yet another reminder that the only route to energy security and sovereignty for the UK is to get off our dependence on fossil fuel markets, whose prices we do not control, and on to clean homegrown power that we do control.

Only several weeks ago, some people were suggesting that we should gamble on low fossil fuel prices and cancel the allocation round 7 renewables auction. When I made my Statement on that auction, I warned the House that people can have incredibly short memories, given that we are just four years on from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. I warned at the time that it was a foolish and dangerous gamble to bet on geopolitical stability during greater geopolitical instability than at any time for generations. I warned that the Opposition had failed to learn lessons from the Ukraine crisis, which caused the worst cost of living crisis in memory, and that a dogma of opposing clean energy would damage this country, and risk families and businesses being left to pick up the bill. The events of recent days have unfortunately shown why that would be such a dangerous and reckless strategy, and we will continue to reject it. Instead, our AR7 renewables auction alone will supply enough homegrown, secure, clean power for the equivalent of 16 million homes. That is power we will not have to source from the international gas market, power that will not be at the mercy of international events, and power over which we, not fossil fuel markets, have control.

Of course, North Sea production continues to play an important and valuable role in our energy system, but as we learn the right lessons from this crisis, this Government will not succumb to the false arguments peddled by some. It is a maturing basin and accounts for less than 0.7% of global oil and gas production. New exploration licences are completely marginal to that basin, and would make no difference to prices set by international markets and paid by UK bill payers.

‘More UK production wouldn’t reduce the global price of gas’—

those are not my words, but those of the former Energy Minister Greg Hands in 2022, in the midst of the last energy crisis. Indeed, the shadow Energy Secretary said in 2023 that new licences

‘wouldn’t necessarily bring energy bills down’.

This Government have taken the decision to keep existing fields open for their lifetime, including through transitional energy certificates in our North Sea future plan, as called for and welcomed by industry. They have also decided not to issue new licences to explore new fields, which the science tells us is the right thing to do, because this Government will not ignore the biggest long-term threat multiplier to our security and stability that we face: the climate crisis.

As the Prime Minister said yesterday, for Labour Members the lesson of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and the lesson of recent days, is that our mission is the only route to greater energy independence for Britain, and we will double down on it. Every solar panel we install, every wind turbine we put up, and every nuclear power station we build makes us more secure as a country, and protects families and businesses from those kinds of energy shocks.

This Government have learned the lessons of the geopolitical instability we have seen and continue to see. In an unstable world, we will keep driving for energy sovereignty and abundance with clean homegrown power. We will not gamble with the British people’s money at the fossil fuel casino, and ignore the lessons of the past. We have shown a determination to act to help families, and we will continue to do so. We will work with our allies and partners to defend our national interest, and seek to bring this conflict to an end for the benefit of citizens at home and the stability of the world, and I commend this Statement to the House”.

[Lord Moynihan (Con)]

My Lords, I declare my interests as chair of Amey, Acteon and Buckthorn.

This Statement comes at a time when the United Kingdom faces major, unparalleled challenges to its energy supply. For 50 years, under successive Conservative and Labour Governments, energy policy has been built on the four pillars of security of supply, diversity of supply to back that security, stronger adherence to ever-improving environmental measures, and, above all, affordability. On all four tests, this Statement fails, and the current war in Iran exposes that the Government’s energy policy is uniquely vulnerable to international supply chains, unaffordable to industry and households alike, glaringly insecure and unashamedly reliant on putting intermittent power before the firm power needed to keep incubators in our hospitals running 24/7, 365.

The Statement argues that there is no point drilling in the North Sea because all our gas is sold on international markets. Does the Minister agree that this is nonsense? Every molecule of gas we extract from the North Sea goes straight into our pipes, making up around half the UK’s supply. Does the Minister agree with the North Sea operators and OEUK that data already submitted to government details 111 named projects, equivalent to £50 billion of investment, that could be unlocked with tax and regulatory reform? On security of supply, we are increasingly vulnerable. Does the Minister accept that we have one pipeline coming to the UK from Norway alone, which is responsible for 30% of our gas supply? As the eminent economist Dieter Helm stated, is this not a sitting duck for a hostile power or an obvious hit for drones in the North Sea?

Does the Minister agree that onshore economically, the UK is facing the highest industrial power prices in the world, crippling our industry and increasing our cost of living? Does he agree that we are failing our energy-dependent industries because we have unaffordable energy prices? Gone is most of the steel industry. Deeply damaged is the fertiliser industry. Through the imposition of additional energy costs this year, the ceramics industry is under threat, as are petrochemicals and refined fuels.

Turning to capacity, does the Minister agree that we already need twice the capacity, twice the grid and all the batteries and storage we can find, plus many more interconnectors, to service a level of power demand of about 45 gigawatts? We used to meet that comfortably with just 60 gigawatts of capacity. Does he not recognise that all this is because we must have therm power available on days like today when the wind does not blow? Only 16% of our electricity was generated from wind today—only double that from the heavily polluting, burning biomass of 7 million tonnes of wood pellets a year in Drax.

Turning to renewables, does the Minister agree that there was good reason for the late publication of the secret MoU between the Secretary of State and the Chinese Government? It demonstrated that not just our renewable energy policy but our overall energy policy is tethered to China, a country which burns more than 55% of the world’s coal and is building another 400 gigawatts of coal generation. Yet our imports of solar panels are nearly 100% imported from China and demonstrate our serious reliance on a foreign state, not least because, as the Minister said from the Dispatch Box recently, he cannot be sure that the solar panels being installed in our schools are not made by slave labour.

Does the Minister agree with me that we need a policy built on renewables and more North Sea gas—not renewables instead of gas? Does he also agree that energy security and affordability depend on a substantial increase in gas from the North Sea, not imported LNG, which has gone up 40% year on year and which, in its total life cycle, emits nearly twice the levels of carbon compared with North Sea gas? The Government need to secure our own gas reserves, first, by a fiscal and regulatory regime which immediately encourages more tiebacks and greater exploitation of existing reserves, then by a licensing regime which ensures that production comes on stream at the same time as new-build nuclear.

None of what I have said this evening is anti-renewable; indeed, when I was Minister for Energy, I launched the first renewables non-fossil fuel obligation and for many years I was president of the British Wind Energy Association. I have set out a direction through which the UK is more energy secure, not less, with more affordable and environmentally acceptable energy; and through which it is more prosperous, with more jobs for working people, greater economic confidence, higher growth and a lower cost of living.

[Earl Russell (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for the Statement on the very serious and fast-moving situation in the Middle East. The recent escalation in the Gulf following President Trump’s deeply destabilising actions risks widening the conflict. Fourteen countries are now directly affected, global shipping supply routes are shut, and once again oil and gas prices have skyrocketed because of geopolitical chaos. With tragic inevitability, the same man who denies the existence of climate change has unleashed another conflict for the control of fossil fuels. If this conflict is not urgently contained, it will shut down oil fields and disrupt global markets, and drive up oil and gas prices, food prices, inflation and government debt alike. We need an urgent halt to the targeting of energy and desalination facilities on all sides.

We have been here before. Despite the progress we are making on our energy transition, the UK remains frighteningly exposed to the harsh economic impacts of global events far beyond our shores. The Energy & Climate Intelligence Unit and E3G estimate that our reliance on fossil fuels has cost this country an additional £183 billion since 2022, because of the increased costs of energy as a result of the war in Ukraine. We cannot afford another lost decade of dependence on global fossil fuels that we neither control nor influence.

While much of the Minister’s Statement is welcome—the co-ordination with allies, reassurance on supply, and commitment to clean power—the real question is whether this Government will now act at the speed and scale the crisis demands. Unlike the last energy crisis, this one includes oil as well as gas. We on these Benches see the Conservatives’ claim that the solution lies in new North Sea licences as the equivalent of trying to fill a swimming pool via a drinking straw. North Sea gas production is down by two-thirds since 2000. It is set to have declined by 97% by 2050, and even with new licences it will decline by 95%.

On oil-related issues, I want to ask about rural constituents who rely on heating oil to heat their homes. Some 1.5 million rural homes and 62% of homes in Northern Ireland depend on it. Prices have rocketed: in some cases, they have nearly doubled. These consumers are the forgotten victims of energy policy, not covered by Ofcom regulation and therefore without price protection and redress. Will the Government now work with the CMA and Ofgem to establish proper oversight, investigate price abuses and ensure that these households are protected?

Disruption to supplies arising from the Gulf crisis has also pushed up the cost of aviation kerosene by more than 80%. What consideration is being given to resilience, as 70% of our kerosene is imported, and how are the Government mitigating escalating costs for consumers and operators alike? On the cost of electricity and gas, we have some stability with the energy price cap, but that is short lived. While our gas supply is more secure than that of oil, gas prices have already reached a 12-month high. There is a very real risk of a renewed cost-of-living squeeze later this year, placing further pressure on families and businesses who are struggling to pay their bills.

The Government must make plans for scenarios where prices stay high and new interventions will be required. Families and businesses deserve reassurance that the Government’s support will not vanish if the crisis endures. I ask the Minister to give that reassurance today. These events bring into sharp relief the deeper issue: the structure of our energy market. Despite our work on renewables, UK consumers remain uninsulated from the global fossil-fuel markets, as our energy market has not been reformed to reflect the increase in renewables uptake. Three years on, we have been told repeatedly that energy market reform is coming. The Government have ruled out the introduction of zonal pricing, but this crisis is a clarion call that urgent action is needed. Why are we still funding crucial decarbonisation and social/environmental levies through household bills rather than general taxation? Moving more of those policy costs into general taxation would help to make the system fairer and more equitable. Will the Government commit to reviewing this balance?

Our gas storage capacity—just 12 days—remains among the lowest in Europe, so will the Minister consider the case for a greater strategic reserve? The price of gas still sets the UK electricity price 97% of the time. Do the Government agree with Greenpeace’s call to bring gas plants into a regulated asset base, creating a strategic reserve administered by NESO to break the link and save customers an estimated £5.2 billion by 2028?

We must double down on the rollout of renewable energy, grid upgrades, long-term storage, diversity of supply and greater energy interconnection with Europe, so that we can gain energy security and price control. Investors need predictability on planning, on grid connection and on the carbon pricing framework. Britain must move to a continuous pipeline of renewable projects: built faster, connected sooner and supported by modernised transmission networks. Every insulated home, every electrified heat pump and every community-scale battery gives us energy independence.

True energy security for Britain will not be won in the North Sea. It will be won on our rooftops, in our grids, in our offshore wind fields and in our insulated homes. If this latest conflict teaches us anything, it is that energy dependence is a choice, and energy independence through clean energy must now become our utmost mission.

[The Minister of State, Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (Lord Whitehead) (Lab)]

I thank the noble Lords for their contributions this evening and I will attempt to address the questions that they have put to me. I must say, however, to be absolutely frank, that there appears to have been one sensible contribution and one not-very-sensible contribution. I will attempt to answer them just the same, but what I thought we were talking about—and I think we are talking about—is the really difficult situation everyone finds themselves in now as a result of the Iran war: what that is likely to do to energy prices, what the likely effect will be on supplies for consumers and industry, and what we can reasonably do to make sure that we have indeed the security that noble Lords have talked about tonight, for our own supplies for the future but also in such a way that we have a secure future ahead of us as well.

In that context, I would have thought that the particular lesson we should draw from the events of the last few days is that we cannot get away from, for various reasons, enormous volatility in the fossil fuels and gas markets abroad. That itself, for various reasons, directly leads to volatility and difficulty with energy prices and energy supplies and various other things. The lesson surely has to be that we should ensure that we have secure, homegrown energy that is not subject to international volatility in the way that we are finding right now, but is also secure for our suppliers and for our consumers, and builds an industry on the back of that which actually creates jobs and businesses and energy arrangements that are secure for the long-term future.

That, of course, is to continue with the moves towards renewables and low-carbon energy, getting the role of gas as far as possible out of our markets and securing a future where our homegrown energy is not only not subject to dictators and petro states but is entirely under our own control: not only under our own control but under our own control as far as the sources of that are concerned.

We have a number of worries and concerns right now about what no one in this Chamber knows too much about—exactly how long this war will continue. Obviously, one earnestly hopes that the war comes to an end fairly soon or that, as the UK Government are pushing, we have a negotiated diplomatic settlement on particular issues for the future. However, we know that prices are going up rapidly at the moment and that there is a bit of a differential between different areas of the oil and gas economy. For example, heating oil, which is not subject to the energy price cap, is going up rapidly. We have to deal with a number of such issues on different fronts pretty immediately, regardless of the long-term future that should be in place for our energy economy.

As far as customer security is concerned, we have the energy price cap in place. That means that, for three months at least, customers of electricity and gas will have cheaper prices than they had over the most recent period. That is protected to that extent. Heating oil is not as protected; we have seen considerable spikes in that, which are also associated with jet fuel, because they are essentially the same thing—kerosene—and we have seen considerable spikes in that. The UK has considerable reserves of jet fuel but does not have the same reserves of heating oil. We have taken action just today in writing to the CMA and leaders in the heating oil industry to make sure that they keep a cap on prices, that they are not price gouging and that they are keeping their prices as modest as they can.

However, all this depends on what happens over the next period with the progress of the war and whether the Strait of Hormuz will be opened or we are at least in a position such that oil and gas can get through it, so that we can start talking about a reasonably reliable supply for world energy coming through in a way that it is not at the moment. Mark my words: this crisis is not about supply. The UK has ample supplies of gas of all sorts—50% of which is from UK fields, assuming it stays in the country. We will perhaps touch on that. We also have supplies from Norway and of liquefied petroleum gas; three terminals have been built and a number of LPG vessels are on their way to the UK, as we speak.

It is not so much about supply but about price and what happens to it if the war continues for a long time. For example, we take only about 1% of our gas in the form of LPG from Qatar—very small supplies—as most of it comes from other sources. But other forces in the world are trying, literally, to turn those LPG vessels around, so that they go to their parts of their world to supply them with LPG at an increasingly high price.

We are clear that we need to take firm action to make sure that we have the right prices for the future, the ability to protect our own energy interests and the ability to make sure that supplies, which are reliable at the moment, continue to be reliable in the longer term.

One thing this is not about is the idea that we should suddenly start drilling for gas or oil and translating a lot more gas and oil back to the UK, which the noble Lord opposite appears to think should be the next move. First, that would take a very long time to happen. Secondly, as I have previously mentioned, it is not the case that this gas would just come to the UK; it goes all around the world at a world price. It would make no difference to the world price, as we have only 0.7% of global oil and gas production in the UK, in any event. It would make no difference to the outcome. The outcome on which we need to work is to continue with our low-carbon policies to get us off gas as quickly as we can and to secure renewable, low-carbon and firm energy through renewables policy in the longer term, so that we are not dependent on gas and this kind of situation never happens ever again. That is clearly the task ahead of us, so I therefore commend to the House this Statement and what it says about the future, despite the situation that we find ourselves in at the moment.

20:22

[The Deputy Speaker (Lord Beith) (LD)]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes of Cumnock, is taking part remotely and I invite him to contribute now.

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op) [V]]

My Lords, I am really sorry that I cannot be there in person this evening, but I am also really grateful that I am being allowed to participate virtually. Does my noble friend the Minister agree with me that, in the current crisis, it is even more important that we have nuclear-powered generation to ensure that the energy supply is guaranteed? Will he consider what can be done to extend the lives of the current generators and to bring new nuclear generation forward earlier than is currently intended? Perhaps most difficult of all is to work towards finding a Government in Scotland who also agree to have nuclear generation.

[Lord Whitehead (Lab)]

I very much welcome my noble friend Lord Foulkes back to his place, as it were. Although he was speaking from a place that is slightly remote, I nevertheless have a real feeling that he is, in essence, in the Chamber with us this evening.

I absolutely endorse what my noble friend had to say on this subject. After all, nuclear is low-carbon, essentially renewable, essentially homegrown and stays with us for a very long time—and, in case anyone had not noticed, this is firm power. Having nuclear in our low-carbon arsenal is very much part of the process of getting ourselves off high-carbon fossil fuels and into a situation where we can control our own energy destiny in this country.

My noble friend will know that work is under way to procure a small modular reactor with Rolls-Royce, which is going very well, and there is the possibility of life extensions to one or more of the existing nuclear power stations, which, again, would be a very good contribution to the energy security of this country for the future.

[Lord Fuller (Con)]

My Lords, this is the week in which the well-meaning but naive approach to net zero finally hit the buffers. It is not just oil—I should know, as a 40-year veteran of the fertiliser industry—it is the gas that produces ammonia and the CO₂ that drives our economy forward. There is no domestic production of ammonia or fertilisers any more; we are reliant on the kindness of strangers. A third of the world production of fertilisers is now stranded beyond the Strait of Hormuz at the moment the crops need it the most. The reality is that farmers will pay a quarter more for their fertiliser immediately, driving food price inflation on beer, bread, biscuits and butter, just like in 2022.

But there is worse. I know that the UK’s cement and steel industries need support for the CBAM. But, from 1 January, farmers will see the prospect of fertiliser going up by a further 25%, turning a calamity into a food security catastrophe. Will the Minister urgently review the fundamental basis for the CBAM, to stop this food disaster being visited on our shores?

[Lord Whitehead (Lab)]

The noble Lord talked about the CBAM and ammonia production in one and a half breaths. On the question of the CBAM, it is a very important part of the low-carbon economy in terms of making sure that there is not carbon seepage from our economy elsewhere and that the low-carbon industry that is being developed is not undermined by rogue dumping and various other things in this state from elsewhere. The CBAM is certainly an important part of the green transition, not an impediment to it.

As far as ammonia is concerned, I am sure the noble Lord knows that there are ways to produce it for the UK market other than relying on gas for it. Certainly, low-carbon ammonia can be quite a substantial chemical for the future. That is, of course, not something that will happen overnight but, clearly, as the noble Lord said, we have no ammonia production in this country on a high-carbon basis, so perhaps we should encourage it on a much lower-carbon basis.

[Lord Reid of Cardowan (Lab)]

My Lords, in the context of media reports over the weekend, can the Minister tell us the most recent assessment that has been made of the adequacy of the UK’s current gas storage capacity to meet demand in the event of a prolonged supply disruption and the absence of an imminent return to a negotiated settlement, which all of us would of course like to see but none of us really expects in the near future? What confidence does the Minister have in that assessment? Finally, can he tell us what recent discussions have taken place with operators of the Rough gas storage facility on its future capacity and role in the UK’s energy security strategy?

[Lord Whitehead (Lab)]

I thank my noble friend for that question, because he alluded to one of the key points about the future of gas storage—the Rough field—and what will happen with that in the future. He will know that there were suggestions that the Rough field should be used for hydrogen storage. That is now not happening, and the Rough field is available for quite a large expansion in overall gas storage.

Having said that, we do not have enormous amounts of gas storage. On the other hand, we do have access to very secure forms of gas, albeit traded on the international markets, with the pipeline interconnectors that we have, the Norwegian gas supply that is freely available to us and, as I mentioned, with the development of LPG terminals in this country, we have the ability to land large amounts of LPG and to store it as well.

My assessment of gas security would be that, although we do not have a huge amount of gas storage, we have, collectively, a pretty secure gas security arrangement. I just drop in the point that we are producing increasing amounts of biogas in the UK, which is beginning to come to a few percentage parts of the gas supply overall. Again, that is a homegrown, secure way of doing it. That I think means that, although we will have a future management issue of declining gas in the system—and there is much less gas going into the system now than a few years ago—we nevertheless have a pretty secure gas arrangement in the UK.

[Lord Howell of Guildford (Con)]

My Lords, having been a Minister through six energy crises rather similar to this one, I cannot resist a bit of sympathy with Ministers having to go through it all again and explain the difficulties over which we have very little control.

Is not the simple truth behind all this that Governments, and this Government certainly, have persistently underestimated the amount of clean electricity that we are going to need for any kind of serious green transition? The data centres—I gather 71 of them are planned—are going to drink it all up. We simply need massive new investment at a pace that does not seem to be contemplated or considered at all. At the moment, we are still talking about 10 years until we try out the SMRs that the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, referred to. We are still arguing about whether Sizewell C, another giant replica, can possibly be afforded and who is going to pay. We are still facing the fact that we are going to need to draw energy of every kind and every source, including particularly gas, from wherever we can get it through interconnectors, neighbours and LNG—the lot—in order to have a modern economy and recovery and growth. It that not the reality?

Can the Minister assure us that the Department for Energy, which seems so lost in all this, has got a grip on the pace at which we need to accelerate our nuclear decisions, storage, which the Minister has been talking about, and all the rest? We seem to be wandering along, with the next crisis almost looming up while we are standing here.

[Lord Whitehead (Lab)]

The noble Lord, who has great experience in these matters, makes important points about how we have to cope with substantial additional electricity demand, particularly as we electrify the economy as a whole, and for new things such as data centre demand and so on. Certainly, calculations suggest that the UK low-carbon energy economy, and the tremendous steps forward in procuring offshore and onshore wind, floating wind and various other things, is beginning to inform the quantum of energy that is needed. There are a lot of difficulties in that process, such as connections which we need to get on with very rapidly and various other things, to make sure that we can decongest the system and that the energy that we are producing gets to where we want it to be. Overall, the low-carbon energy revolution is up to the task of producing the additional electricity that we are going to use in the system for the future.

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, the person smiling this evening is President Putin of the Russian Federation, because an economy that was hugely under pressure is going to be relieved when it comes to oil prices. In fact, I read this evening that Putin has offered to help Europe out with its gas shortage. I hope that will not be the case. Will the Minister speak to his Ministry of Defence and Foreign Office counterparts to put much more emphasis, work and pressure on stopping the shadow fleet of the Russian Federation being able to operate, which is its supply line that enables it to continue fighting the war against Ukraine that is a threat to us all?

[Lord Whitehead (Lab)]

I agree with the noble Lord that Putin may well be smiling a little at the prospect of sky-high energy prices benefiting his beleaguered economy, and that some of the sanctions may be taken off him because people would rather like some of his oil and gas for the future. It is doubly important, therefore, that we keep those sanctions in place, that we sanction the shadow fleet, and that we make sure that the oil from Russia does not get out, by hook or by crook, into various places where it should not go. The UK Government are determined to keep that process under way. It is very important that Putin is not the unwitting beneficiary of this.

[Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Lab)]

My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend the Minister on the Statement that has been made. In supporting the Government’s policy on alternative renewables, I ask that particular attention is given to Northern Ireland, where two-thirds of the population is reliant on fossil fuels, particularly oil, for central heating. I declare an interest in that, along with many other people. Will the Minister, along with his colleagues in the Northern Ireland Office, discuss ways to mitigate the impact on consumers in Northern Ireland, who will face high electricity bills due to the current global market conditions as a result of the war in Iran?

[Lord Whitehead (Lab)]

My noble friend is right that, quite uniquely within the UK, Northern Ireland has a preponderance of oil used for heating, as opposed to the relatively small percentage in England, Wales and Scotland. It is particularly important that we get a grip on heating oil and kerosene in general at an early stage in this process. That is why the Government have undertaken the initiative today to make sure that the industry is very clear about how it manages the price of heating oil for the future and does not engage in price gouging as a result of this particular energy crisis. But prices in general will probably be subject to the duration of this war. Part of the process has to be to make sure that this war comes to an end as soon as it can, that supplies are secured, and that confidence is restored in the fact that energy can pass reasonably unhindered from the site of the war to its destinations. The UK Government are very involved in doing that.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, an investigation today by the Guardian finds that a series of government announcements to

“mainline AI into the veins”

of the UK economy are riddled with “phantom investments” and what the Guardian describes as “shaky accounting”. In the light of this Statement on energy markets, is this not perversely a good thing? Does the Minister agree with me that we need to be thinking about the kind of energy use that is truly beneficial and efficient, both environmentally and economically, given that, as Ofgem concluded last month, 140 proposed data centre energy projects could need more power than the current peak demand? I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Moynihan, that we have to keep powering the incubators for ill babies in hospitals. That is surely more important than generating AI slop of pictures of Jesus Christ made up of shrimps.

[Lord Whitehead (Lab)]

I thank the noble Baroness for that interesting image of what we do not want to happen, as opposed to what we do want to happen. Of course, what we want to happen is real, low-carbon energy projects, and there is an enormous amount of investment—£90 billion is the figure from 2024—going into the low-carbon green economy at the moment, running three times as fast as the general economy. However, that investment has to be in real things. An issue that Ofgem is dealing with at the moment is distinguishing between what you might call tyre-kicker projects that want to come online in order to fund a speculative project, and those that really are necessary for our energy renaissance as a low-carbon energy superpower. The only way to become an energy superpower is to have a super-powered energy economy of real projects with real connections that actually do the business in the way the noble Baroness suggested, rather than being diverted into things that may or may not happen and are largely speculative at the moment in their promotion and origin.

[Viscount Trenchard (Con)]

Can the Minister please tell the House why the Government have delayed publishing their response to last November’s report from the Nuclear Regulatory Taskforce? Are they going to act and implement the review’s recommendations, and if so, when? It is hugely regrettable that we have thrown away our former leading position in nuclear power. Why have this Government stopped the AMR competition after phase B? Will there ever be a phase C? No update has been published on the government website since July 2023. We know that small high-temperature gas-cooled reactors could be playing a large part in meeting our electricity and industrial energy needs much sooner than currently envisaged. They also enable the production of hydrogen at scale, which is also a priority for our future energy mix.

[Lord Whitehead (Lab)]

I may have to write to the noble Viscount on aspects of that question that I am not fully sighted on. If he is referring to the Fingleton review, for example, then a great deal of work is being undertaken on that. Part of the issue with that review is how it translates itself into legislation for the future, and that is being fully considered. However, I assure the noble Viscount that that is not a particular cause of delays; it is a question of getting it right and making sure that what is in the review can properly inform the debate for the future.

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)]

My Lords, can we come back to the North Sea and the Opposition’s obsession with it? Can my noble friend confirm that between 2010 and 2024, production in the North Sea halved? It is a super-mature basin that, even if new licences were to be granted, would have a marginal impact. On the issue of gas being used to substitute for renewables when the wind is not blowing, would we not be in a much better position if the Opposition, when in government over 14 years, had actually managed to open one single nuclear power station?

[Lord Whitehead (Lab)]

My noble friend is right that the North Sea is not just a mature field but a very mature one. Indeed, as we are seeing, one of the opportunities for the North Sea is not so much getting oil out of the ground but putting carbon back into it, in terms of exhausted fields that are presently near their demise or thereabouts.

There is no magic wand that we can wave to suddenly produce lots of new oil and gas in the North Sea; we are talking about small pools, small fields and so on, if at all. The emphasis clearly has to be on making sure that production continues, not on ensuring that exploration—chasing a bit of a will-o’-the-wisp in terms of the field—is under way.

My noble friend is also right that the previous Government did indeed fail to produce a single nuclear power station during the entire time of their regime, whereas now we are on the cusp of making sure that small nuclear modular reactors are a thing of the future and that we have the sort of nuclear economy that is fit for a low-carbon economy—generally dispatchable, smaller, nimble and part of the energy economy.

Crime and Policing Bill

Monday 9th March 2026 Lords Chamber

Report (4th Day) (Continued)

20:45

Clause 141: Powers of senior officers to impose conditions on protests

Amendment 374

Moved by

[Baroness Doocey]

374: Clause 141, page 182, line 42, at end insert—
“(4) After section 14, insert—“14ZZA Imposition of conditions: live facial recognitionPrior to imposing conditions under either section 12 (imposing conditions on public processions) or 14 (imposing conditions on public assemblies), the senior officer of the police force in question must confirm that live facial recognition will not be in use, unless a new statutory code of practice for the use of live facial recognition surveillance in public spaces in England and Wales has previously been presented to, and approved by, both Houses of Parliament.””Member's explanatory statement
This amendment ensures that police cannot use live facial recognition technology when imposing conditions on public assemblies or processions under sections 12 or 14, unless a new, specific code of practice governing its use in public spaces has first been formally approved by both Houses of Parliament. It is intended to safeguard public privacy and civil liberties by requiring democratic oversight before this surveillance technology is deployed in such contexts.

[Baroness Doocey (LD)]

My Lords, Amendment 374 seeks to place statutory guardrails on the use of live facial recognition, echoing the recent calls from the Equality and Human Rights Commission. We recognise that this technology can assist the police in tackling serious crime, but it must be used responsibly. Its rapid spread into everyday policing before essential safeguards or parliamentary scrutiny are in place raises profound constitutional concerns, particularly in the policing of dissent. Amendment 374 addresses the most contentious use of this technology, at protests and public assemblies. It would prohibit live facial recognition when police impose conditions under the Public Order Act unless and until Parliament had approved a new statutory code of practice. These are moments when people exercise their fundamental rights to free expression and peaceful assembly; rights which depend on participants feeling safe from tracking or retrospective profiling.

This Bill already tightens protest offences and curbs anonymity; layering unregulated facial scanning on top of those restrictions risks further shrinking the space for lawful dissent. Many people will have perfectly legitimate reasons to think twice before attending a demonstration if they know their face may be scanned. Without clarity on how watch-lists used at protests are compiled, people have no way of knowing whether they are being flagged for genuine risk or for the views they hold. At a protest, the chilling effect is not just about being scanned; it is the fear of political profiling. If the Government cannot clearly define who is a legitimate target for facial recognition at a peaceful assembly, then such deployments are, by definition, arbitrary and cannot meet the legal test of necessity and proportionality.

Operationally, the emerging concerns around false positives and the significantly increased risk to those from minority-ethnic backgrounds are a real headache for policing large public gatherings. Deployment without a code of practice will likely result in dozens of wrongful stops to verify identities, with confrontations that divert officers from real security threats and de-escalating crowds. We have already seen how damaging these errors can be. Just in the last few weeks, an innocent south Asian man was arrested at his home in Southampton for a burglary 100 miles away in Milton Keynes. He was handcuffed and held for nearly 10 hours because he was wrongly matched to CCTV footage by a Home Office algorithm that its own research shows produces significantly higher false positives for black and Asian faces. Last month, a man was publicly ejected from his local supermarket after staff misinterpreted a facial recognition alert.

These are not minor glitches to be shrugged off. They are serious violations that erode public trust, particularly in communities already wary of state power. The Government’s consultation is welcome, but it is far too slow for the pace of change we see on our streets. Until Parliament has set clear rules, Amendment 374 is both necessary and proportionate. We must ensure that Parliament, not oblique algorithms, decides the limit of state power. I beg to move.

[Lord Strasburger (LD)]

My Lords, we are talking today about live facial recognition at protests and why the police must not be allowed to use it until Parliament has agreed a clear and democratic code of practice. At its heart, Amendment 374 is about power and trust. Live facial recognition is not just another camera on a street corner; it is a mass surveillance tool that can scan every face in a crowd, compare people in real time against a watch-list and permanently change what it feels like to stand in the public square. Once you normalise all that at protests, you change the character of protest itself.

If people think that simply turning up at a demonstration means that their face can be scanned, logged and potentially mismatched to a suspect list, some will decide that it is safer to stay at home. That is a direct, chilling effect on the right to protest, to assemble and to speak out against, or for, the Government. We should not let that happen by stealth through a patchwork of local decisions and internal guidance that most citizens will never see. That is what is happening at the moment.

The technology itself is far from neutral. We know that facial recognition systems can and do get things wrong. They perform differently across age groups and ethnicities. A false match in the context of a protest is not a minor inconvenience. It can mean being stopped, questioned, detained or stigmatised in front of your friends, your colleagues or your community, not because of something you did but because an algorithm made a guess. Allowing that at political protests without proper rules and oversight is an invitation to injustice.

It is not enough to say, “Trust the police. We have internal policies”. The question here is not whether any particular chief constable is well-intentioned; it is whether the state should be able to scan and track people at political gatherings without Parliament having debated, defined and limited that power. In a democracy, if the Government want tools that can alter the balance of power between citizen and state, they must come to Parliament, set out the case and accept constraints.

That is why a publicly debated statutory code of practice matters. It is where we answer basic questions that are currently left in the grey zone. In what circumstances, if any, is live facial recognition at a protest justified? Who sets the watch-lists and on what criteria? What happens to images of people who are not of interest? Are they actually deleted? If so, how quickly? Who can access them and for what purposes? What independent oversight exists when things go wrong? Until those questions are answered openly, the use of live facial recognition at protests rests on unpublished risk assessments and technical documents that ordinary citizens cannot challenge and that elected representatives cannot easily amend. That is the opposite of how intrusive powers should be operated in a liberal democracy.

We should also be honest about the precedent. If we accept live facial recognition at protests now, without a code, it will be used more often and for more purposes later. Once the infrastructure is there and the practice is normalised, it will be very hard to row back. The time to set limits is before the rollout, not after the abuses. Police should not have, without parliamentary approval, the ability to quietly turn every protest into a data-harvesting exercise, watching not just the few who pose a risk but the many who are simply exercising their rights.

The principle is simple: if live facial recognition is to be used at all in the context of political protest, it must be under a clear and democratically approved code of practice, debated in Parliament, tested against our human rights obligations and subject to real oversight and redress. Until that is in place, the police should not be allowed to deploy this technology at protests.

[Lord Pannick (CB)]

This is another context where there has to be a fair balance between competing interests. One can easily see that the use of live facial recognition is a vital policing tool. However, as has been explained, it has an adverse impact on privacy. What concerns me is that the European Convention on Human Rights and the Human Rights Act require not merely that steps taken are necessary and proportionate, which the noble Baroness, Lady Doocey, rightly referred to, but it is a requirement that any restrictions or provisions in such a context must be prescribed by law.

I am very concerned that having police authorities and police officers exercising a pure discretion, without any statutory guidance or code of practice, may well fail that legal test of prescribed by law, because of the uncertainty and the excess of discretion. Therefore, the Government would be well advised in this sensitive context to ensure that there is statutory guidance and a statutory code of practice. The Minister may be unable to accept this amendment, but I hope he will be able to tell the House that steps will be taken to provide clear guidance to police authorities as to the use of this technology.

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, I rise to speak to Amendment 374, which I have signed, but also to Amendment 430, which I tabled.

The use of live facial recognition in our public spaces is an extraordinary expansion of state power that currently exists in a legal vacuum. We are not Luddites on these Benches; we recognise the utility of technology, but we must ensure that live facial recognition is a targeted tool used under the rule of law and not a blanket surveillance net that chills the right to move freely and anonymously in our streets. The use of live facial recognition technology in public spaces poses a profound challenge to our civil liberties that cannot be met purely by internal police guidance. We are witnessing a fundamental shift in the nature of British policing—a shift, if you like, from the line-fishing of traditional human observation to the deep ocean trawling of automated mass surveillance.

Amendments 374 and 430 collectively seek to provide the democratic and judicial safeguards currently missing from what the experts have called a regulatory lacuna or legislative void. Amendment 374 prohibits the use of LFR during public assemblies or processions, unless a specific code of practice has been approved by both Houses of Parliament, as my noble friends have explained. In a free society, individuals should not have to pay the price of handing over their sensitive biometric data just to engage in democratic protest. We must safeguard public privacy and civil liberties by requiring democratic oversight before this technology is deployed against those exercising their right to assembly. We cannot have policing by algorithm without democratic oversight.

The current lack of oversight creates a documented chilling effect. Research by the Ada Lovelace Institute indicates that nearly one-third of the public are uncomfortable with police use of LFR, and up to 38% of young Londoners, for instance, have stated they would stay away from protests or public events if they knew that this technology was being used. We cannot allow our public squares to become spaces where citizens are treated as walking barcodes or a nation of suspects.

Critically, Amendment 430 would establish that the use of LFR in public spaces must be limited to narrowly defined serious cases and require judicial approval. It would provide the fundamental safeguards our society requires. It would prohibit the use of LFR by any authority unless it was for the investigation of serious crimes and had received prior judicial authorisation specifying the scope and duration of its use. We must ensure that this technology is used as a targeted tool, not a blanket surveillance net.

21:00

The Government maintain that internal police authorisation is sufficient. However, the 2020 Bridges judgment found the existing legal framework woefully inadequate, noting that far too much discretion is left to individual officers regarding where LFR is deployed and who is added to watch-lists. The constitutional principle is clear: if the police require a judicial warrant to invade a single home, they should certainly require judicial approval before scanning the sensitive biometric data of tens of thousands of innocent citizens in a public square.

Furthermore, we must challenge the narrative that this is a precise tool. Independent reviews have found that the Met’s trials were verifiably accurate in only 19% of cases and approximately 87% of alerts generated by its system. We cannot allow technological deployment to race ahead of democratic deliberation. These amendments would ensure that this technology is used proportionately and under the rule of law. We must act now to prevent what has been rightly called a shortcut to a widespread surveillance state. I should just say that National Physical Laboratory studies confirm the problems. While the most recent NPL study last year noted improvements in algorithm performance, it confirmed that demographic differentials persist. Specifically, when settings are adjusted to a standard threshold, false positive rates remain higher for individuals with darker skin tones compared to those with lighter skin tones.

The Government often cite minimal discrepancies at specific technical settings. However, in operational use, police forces frequently lower the similarity threshold to increase the number of matches, which exponentially increases the risk of misidentification for women and minority groups. For all these reasons, we need to introduce the controls set out in Amendments 374 and 430.

[Baroness Lawlor (Con)]

My Lords, I support these amendments because it is very important that live facial recognition should be subject to legal oversight and judicial oversight; there should be a law. We should see such amendments in the context of an overall parliamentary democracy which believes in lawful freedom of expression, whether it is in Parliament, the newspapers or public places. Live facial recognition without a proper legal framework could be used in an undemocratic fashion. Police, sadly, will find evidence very often for whomever they wish to convict. I know that is not necessarily the case, but if you are under pressure as a police officer to make your case stick, you will trawl whatever evidence you can to get it through to the stage of being investigated. I urge your Lordships to support these amendments because they will strengthen our democracy, and it is important that people should feel that they live in a free country, not in one subject to the sort of powers we see exercised in other countries, such as China.

[Lord Davies of Gower (Con)]

My Lords, this group of amendments returns us to an issue debated at some length in Committee: the use of live facial recognition technology in policing. I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Doocey, and the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, for tabling these amendments on this important topic.

As set out in Committee, we on these Benches cannot support proposals that would severely restrict or pre-empt the operational use of live facial recognition by law enforcement. Live facial recognition is an increasingly important tool in modern policing. Used lawfully and proportionately, it has already demonstrated its value in identifying serious offenders, locating wanted individuals and preventing violent crime before it occurs. It has been deployed particularly effectively in high-risk environments such as transport hubs and major public events, where rapid identification can make a decisive difference in protecting the public.

That does not mean that safeguards are unnecessary. There must always be a careful balance between the protection of civil liberties and the need to equip police with effective tools to tackle serious crime. The use of new technologies must be proportionate and subject to appropriate oversight, but the amendments before us would go significantly further than that. In different ways, they would either prohibit particular uses of the technology, place rigid statutory barriers in its way or create restrictions that would unnecessarily impede the ability of the police to deploy it where it may be most needed. Amendment 374 would prohibit the deployment of live facial recognition in the context of public assemblies or impose extensive prior authorisation requirements. It risks tying the hands of the police at precisely the moments when rapid and flexible operational decision-making may be required.

We must recognise the points raised in Committee that the Government are currently consulting on the future regulatory framework for live facial recognition. To attempt to settle these questions piecemeal through amendments to this Bill would risk creating an incomplete or inconsistent framework. While the concerns raised by noble Lords are legitimate and deserve careful consideration, we should not default to restricting a technology that has already shown its potential to disrupt serious criminality and protect the public. The challenge is not to prohibit its use but to ensure that it is deployed responsibly, lawfully and proportionately. For those reasons, we cannot support the amendments in this group. I look forward to the Minister’s response.

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Lord Hanson of Flint) (Lab)]

I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Doocey, for tabling these amendments and to the noble Lord, Lord Davies, for supporting some of the arguments that I will make in response to them. The noble Lords, Lord Clement-Jones, Lord Strasburger and Lord Pannick, and the noble Baroness, Lady Lawlor, have all put their finger on their concerns around the use of this technology.

I will begin by providing a view of what live facial recognition does. It allows for real-time location of individuals of interest to the police. It scans the faces of those passing a camera in real time, comparing faces against a predetermined, specific watch-list of, potentially, wanted criminals, vulnerable missing persons or individuals posing risks to public safety. If no match is made—this goes to the point that the noble Lord, Lord Strasburger, made—currently, the scanned face is deleted instantly. Every deployment and every specific bespoke watch-list for that deployment must have a defined policing objective, be supported by clear intelligence and ultimately be determined by humans.

Noble Lords will be aware that the use of facial recognition technology in all circumstances, including in live facial recognition, is already subject to safeguards, including those provided in the Human Rights Act and the Data Protection Act. I agree that there needs to be a framework, which is the nub of what I think all noble Lords have said in this debate.

The noble Baroness, Lady Doocey, will know that the Government had a 10-week consultation for that very purpose—to look at the issues of a legal framework where law enforcement use of biometrics, facial recognition and similar technologies could be used. The consultation ended on 12 February. I give the House an assurance that the Government intend to respond to it by the summer; we have more or less a 12-week deadline from the end of its closing, but it will be by the summer. The consultation is clear that the Government need to design a new framework and assess how the police use technologies such as facial recognition. It needs to ensure that there are safeguards, as noble Lords have mentioned, around the rights to freedom of expression and freedom of assembly, that we protect these rights and that facial recognition technology is demonstrably proportionate to the seriousness of the harm being addressed.

We are currently considering the consultation and, as the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Gower, said, that should take its course. However, we intend to set out our proposals in due course, which will be subject to scrutiny by both Houses of Parliament. I hope noble Lords accept that it would not be appropriate to pre-empt the outcome of the consultation or the proposals that Government will bring forward, which we will ensure have new legal framework for the use of facial recognition technology by law enforcement agencies.

While I think that the points made by noble Lords have real merit, I hope that, with the comments I have made and the reassurances I have given, we will save the difficult debate about regulation, how it operates and what the proposals mean for a proper legal framework for another day, which will come very soon. I hope the noble Baroness will—

[Lord Strasburger (LD)]

Before the Minister sits down, could he give the House some indication of when the day will come when we have a debate on some meaningful proposals? Could he also tell the House whether those proposals will cover the use of this technology by the private sector—which is happening a lot already in retail—as well as the public sector?

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

As I have tried to indicate to the noble Lord, we have had a consultation that finished on 12 February, and we intend to respond to it by the summer. Currently, what that response will be is to be formulated, so I will not give him chapter and verse on when and how. However, if legislation is required, we will look at that at the earliest opportunity, as we always do.

I cannot pre-empt the King’s Speech and I cannot give a timetable on that, but I will give a timetable when we respond to the consultation. We should remember that the Government initiated the consultation—we were not forced into it—to get to a position whereby the very issues that noble Lords have mentioned today are considered. With those comments, I hope the noble Baroness will withdraw her amendment.

[Baroness Doocey (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister and all noble Lords who have spoken. I have no doubt at all that everything the Minister said, he actually believes. But it reminds me of when I was on the Metropolitan Police Authority for the first time and I went round all the police stations in London—I think there were 32 at the time, with 32 borough commanders. The first thing I noticed was that, at the time, if you took samples, they had to be stored in a fridge for X number of days at a particular temperature and then they had to be destroyed within another number of days. In almost 60% of the stations I visited, none of this had happened.

So I understand what the Minister is saying: that unnecessary facial recognition photographs will be destroyed instantly. But I would feel much happier if there was some process for ensuring that that is being done and a way of checking that. I am pleased to hear that there is going to be a debate on what guardrails are needed—because they are desperately needed—but, for now, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 374 withdrawn.

Amendment 375

Moved by

[Lord Hanson of Flint]

375: After Clause 142, insert the following new Clause—
“Return to unauthorised encampments: prohibited period(1) The Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 is amended as follows.(2) In section 60C(3) (offence relating to residing on land without consent in or with a vehicle) for “12” substitute “three”.(3) In section 61 (power to remove trespassers on land)—(a) in subsection (4)(b) for “prohibited period” substitute “period of three months beginning with the day on which the direction was given”;(b) omit subsection (4ZA).(4) In section 62 (supplementary powers of seizure)—(a) in subsection (1)(b) for “prohibited period” substitute “period of three months beginning with the day on which the direction was given”;(b) omit subsection (1A).(5) In section 62B(2) (failure to comply with direction under section 62A: offences) for “twelve” substitute “three”.(6) In section 62C(2) (failure to comply with direction under section 62A: seizure) for “twelve” substitute “three”.”Member’s explanatory statement
This new clause changes the period within which a person directed to leave an unauthorised encampment must not return from twelve months to three.

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

My Lords, in moving Amendment 375 in my name I pay tribute to my noble friend Lady Whitaker for the discussions we had both in Committee and outside it, which resulted in the amendment being brought forward today on Report.

Amendment 375 addresses the no-return period for individuals directed to leave an unauthorised encampment. This new clause restores the previous three-month period, replacing the 12-month prohibitions introduced by the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022. The Government remain firmly committed to ensuring that communities feel safe, public spaces are protected and unauthorised encampments do not cause disproportionate disruption or distress. At the same time, we must ensure that enforcement powers are applied fairly and in a way that respects the rights of all individuals, including those in the Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities. I thank my noble friend Lady Whitaker for her campaigning on this issue, and for meeting with me and representatives from the all-party group for Gypsy, Roma and Traveller Communities earlier this year.

As she knows, and as I hope the House will be aware, in May 2024, the High Court found that setting and extending the no-return period to 12 months was incompatible with ECHR rights. This was because of the limited availability of authorised transit sites, meaning that individuals could be placed at risk of criminal sanction even when no lawful alternative was available. In light of this ruling, on their election in 2024 the new Government examined this, and it is right that we use this Bill to remedy that incompatibility.

21:15

Amendment 375 does exactly that. It amends the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 to reinstate the three-month no-return period that operated successfully for many years. It also does the same for the new offence in Section 60C, added by the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022. This strikes a more proportionate balance by maintaining an important enforcement tool for police, while ensuring that individuals are not penalised in circumstances where alternative sites are in scarce supply, and maintaining a three-month maximum stay. Let me be clear that this change does not weaken police powers to respond to unauthorised encampments that cause damage, disruption or distress. The full suite of powers introduced by the 2022 Act remains in place. This amendment simply ensures that those powers operate proportionately and in a manner compliant with human rights obligations.

I know that my noble friend Lady Whitaker may well also speak on the amendments on the important issue of the lack of permitted sites. Before she does, I will say that the Government agree that planning appropriately for the housing and accommodation needs of diverse communities is essential. Planning policy is clear that local authorities should assess the need for Traveller sites. This includes a responsibility to set pitch and plot targets for Traveller sites and provide five years-worth of sites against targets.

There is a revised National Planning Policy Framework which is currently out for consultation through the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government until 10 March. However, I will listen to what my noble friend says, and what anybody from the Liberal Democrats says in support of their amendments. I thought I would just use these introductory comments to both move the amendment and say that we recognise that the National Planning Policy Framework needs to be examined, and that is why it is currently out for consultation on the very issue that the amendments address. I beg to move.

[Baroness Whitaker (Lab)]

My Lords, I first declare an interest as president of Friends, Families and Travellers and the Advisory Council for the Education of Romany and other Travellers, and co-chair of the relevant APPG. It is in that connection that I applaud these amendments. They right an acknowledged wrong, a breach of the Human Rights Act, the remedy for which was fought for in the courts by a brave Romany Gypsy, Wendy Smith. They will give our few remaining nomadic families some limited means of continuing to live in the way the courts have agreed they are entitled to.

As my noble friend the Minister said in the meeting he called to discuss the amendment, for which I, the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Manchester, who is not in his place, our colleagues in the NGOs, Wendy Smith’s barrister and the few thousand Travellers affected—and it is only a few thousand—are very grateful, it is “a stage in a journey”. That journey is the path to equal treatment and the end of the dwelling discrimination which comes from the lack of permitted sites. The actions to move farther along in the journey through greater provision of sites do not lie with his department, but my noble friend the Minister has helpfully said something more about the future. If he has any details on timing and more precise allocation of responsibility, we should welcome them. As I said, they are not inherently matters for his department, but I would like to hear the whole Government supporting this. I commend these amendments.

[Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville (LD)]

My Lords, I declare my interest as a member of the APPG for Gypsies, Travellers and Roma, and speak in support of Amendments 375, 466 and 468. I thank the Minister, the noble Lord, Lord Hanson, for his introduction to this important group of amendments. As has been said, this is the start of a journey to reach equality of access to services for those currently living a nomadic life.

Several noble Lords across the Chamber made representations against the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act, brought in under the previous Government in 2022 and subsequently ruled to be a breach of the Human Rights Act. Those who objected listed the effect the new restrictions would have on family life, those with health issues and access to education, et cetera. In a society that purports to uphold the rationale of equality for all, it is unacceptable to discriminate against those who follow a different lifestyle from the majority of us.

I have long campaigned for legislation to require every local authority to provide permitted permanent sites for Gypsies and Travellers alongside permitted temporary stopping sites for those who travel as part of their culture and way of life. This has always been rejected by Governments of different political persuasions, and I welcome the Minister’s comments this evening on the provision of sites in the future.

I am now lucky enough to live in an area that has adequate, decent provision for those identified as Gypsy, Roma or Traveller. Several of those sites are within a short walk of my home. I am delighted that those people are able to be married in the church in which I also worship, and that they are able to grieve the passing of their loved ones in the same environment. Everyone should be able to access education for their children, alongside healthcare for their elderly, even if they are moving from area to area around the country. A stopping place or site which allows this to happen should be a right, and not left to a local landowner to permit for short periods.

This small group of amendments is not a magic wand to ensure that sites appear overnight, but it is a step in the right direction to help families raise their children in a relatively safe environment. I support the Minister’s amendments.

[Lord Davies of Gower (Con)]

My Lords, I welcome the opportunity for debate that the Government’s Amendment 375 has afforded us. This is obviously a highly contested issue but, before we start, I put on record the very specific nature of the issue we are debating. In 2024, the High Court declared that a specific section of the Conservative Party’s Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 was incompatible with Article 14, the prohibition of discrimination, and Article 8, the right to private life, of the European Convention on Human Rights. That section extended the prohibition on returning to land covered by requests to leave from three to 12 months. That is why the Government are now attempting to reverse that change. The judgment did not, as claimed in Committee, nullify that no-returns order.

I will make His Majesty’s Loyal Opposition’s position clear: although we accept that the law as it currently stands renders the continuation of the current offence of returning to or re-entering prohibited land untenable, we would ultimately rather that the human rights law that has caused this incompatibility be repealed and the offence upheld. It is not racial discrimination to uphold one of the fundamental governing systems of our society. As perhaps some noble Lords in the Chamber will want to hear, private property has been a continuous thread throughout our history that has galvanised peace and prosperity in our country. Remove the right to private property and you create a system that favours freeloaders and fraudsters.

In the judgment, the presiding judge spoke of a balanced structure between the property rights of landowners and occupiers and the interests of Travellers. The increase in a no-returns order from three to 12 months would supposedly disproportionately affect the balance in favour of landowners. I do not believe that the interests of trespassers should be equally balanced with those of landowners and occupiers, if at all. That does not pertain to the Gypsy Traveller community; it does not matter who the people are. Declaring that the right to private property should trump the subjective desires of an individual or group does not have a racial element. It is an entirely neutral law and fundamentally liberal, in that it affords the same freedoms to all.

It is true to the latter point that it is disheartening to see the party that was once the vehicle of Manchester liberalism now supporting such a partial and anarchic view of the world. Therefore, if the law posits that upholding the belief in private property and enacting its enforcement in law is considered wrong, the law should be repealed. If the law ascertains that private property undermines an abstract theory of human rights and that the latter should prevail, the law should be repealed. If the law favours the human rights of the infringer over the victim, the law should be repealed. If the law is able to overturn the decision of a sovereign, elected Parliament acting of its own volition, the law should almost certainly be repealed.

Therefore, although we welcome the Government’s attempt to find a compromise between our legal commitments, we are unfortunately of the opinion that they are amending the wrong Act entirely. They are still rather dogmatic in their commitment to this outdated doctrine, but they are simply kicking the can down the road and delaying the inevitable. Whether the courts allow a three-month no-return period is immaterial; there would still exist an extrajudicial doctrine that has the ultimate say over the United Kingdom’s Parliament. There will simply be an appeal to this amendment, and if that is unsuccessful, they will find themselves facing the ECHR in another challenge to another Act.

We are sympathetic to the Government’s attempt at a balancing act, but they are targeting the symptoms over the cause. That cause is the ECHR enshrined in the Human Rights Act. The ECHR has served its purpose, but the fact that it now favours rule-breakers over rule-takers shows that it does so no longer. The Government must recognise this truth, and I suspect that deep down they do. They should follow the advice of the Conservative Party and leave the ECHR. Perhaps the Minister will reply bearing good news.

[Lord Pannick (CB)]

Before the Minister replies, I suggest to the noble Lord, Lord Davies, that the rule-breakers are not those who want to return within three months; they are the local authorities that have statutory obligations to provide proper sites for Travellers but are failing to do so.

[Lord Davies of Gower (Con)]

I accept that, to a certain degree.

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

Let me clear up something straight away. There is not going to be a meeting of minds between me and the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Gower, on the abolition of the ECHR. I will leave it at that. There is no common ground between us. Yes, we are generally looking at some reforms, but there is no common ground on abolishing the lot, which is what the noble Lord seeks to achieve. There is blue/red/orange water between us on this; I will leave it at that.

On the question raised, I am grateful for the support of my noble friend Lady Whitaker and the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville. We have moved in light of the judgments that were made, and we have instated the three-month period in this legislation. That is the right thing to do in relation to the legislation. I think the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Gower, accepted that, while having a wider target. At the moment, I will take his acceptance of that as support. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell, for her support, and I am grateful for the constant chivvying of my noble friend Lady Whitaker on this issue.

In my opening remarks, in anticipation of what would be said, I said that the Government agree that planning appropriately for the housing and accommodation needs of our diverse communities is essential in supporting sustainable and inclusive growth. It is important, as the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, just reminded the House, that the responsibility to set pitch and plot targets for Traveller sites lies with local authorities, and absolutely right that they must identify specific deliverable sites sufficient for five years against targets. As I said in my opening remarks, a revised National Planning Policy Framework and the Planning Policy for Traveller Sites were published at the end of December 2024, following extensive consultation.

The Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government is currently consulting on a new national planning framework. That consultation runs until 10 March. The noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell, and my noble friend Lady Whitaker mentioned the need to look at more sites. That is actively being looked at. Despite the wide reservations of the noble Lord, but with the support of the Liberal Democrat Benches and my colleague Lady Whitaker, I hope that my amendments can be accepted by the House tonight.

Amendment 375 agreed.

21:30

Amendment 376

Moved by

[Lord Hanson of Flint]

376: After Clause 142, insert the following new Clause—
“Harassment of a person in their home(1) The Criminal Justice and Police Act 2001 is amended as follows.(2) In section 42 (police directions stopping harassment etc of a person in their home), in subsection (1)(b)—(a) omit the “or” at the end of sub-paragraph (i);(b) after sub-paragraph (ii) insert—“(iii) that they should not have done something they were entitled or required to do; or(iv) that they should have done something they were not under any obligation to do;”.(3) In section 42A (offence of harassment etc of a person in their home), in subsection (1)(b)—(a) omit the “or” at the end of sub-paragraph (i);(b) after sub-paragraph (ii) insert—“(iii) that they should not have done something they were entitled or required to do; or(iv) that they should have done something they were not under any obligation to do;”.”Member's explanatory statement
This amendment expands sections 42 and 42A of the Criminal Justice and Police Act 2001 (protests outside homes) to cover protests about something done in the past.

Amendment 376 agreed.

Amendment 377

Moved by

[Lord Faulks]

377: After Clause 142, insert the following new Clause—
“Lawful or reasonable excuse defence for public order offences(1) This section applies to any offence that makes conduct unlawful unless there is an excuse for it and specifies either that the excuse must be a lawful excuse or that it must be a reasonable one.(2) A person has no excuse for the conduct if—(a) it is intended to intimidate, provoke, inconvenience or otherwise harm members of the public by interrupting or disrupting their freedom to carry on a lawful activity, or(b) it is designed to influence the government or public opinion by subjecting any person, or their property, to a risk, or increased risk, of loss or damage.(3) It is immaterial that there are or may be other excuses or reasons for the conduct or that its main purpose may be different.(4) In this section “conduct” includes any act or omission.(5) For the purposes of the Human Rights Act 1998, this section must be treated as necessary in a democratic society for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.”Member's explanatory statement
This amendment clarifies when a person has a lawful or reasonable excuse to a public order offence.

[Lord Faulks (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, this group of amendments was due to be heard last Wednesday. We were sent away just before midnight but reassured that they would be heard first thing on Monday. Well, it is 9.30 pm; I suppose that is first thing.

Amendment 377 is an important amendment, supported by the noble Lords, Lord Godson, Lord Hogan-Howe and Lord Davies. It is about lawful or reasonable excuse for public order offences. It is not particularly easy for a legislature to say what could constitute a reasonable excuse. However, the law is currently in a mess. The culprit is the Ziegler case, in which the Supreme Court, by a majority, said that whatever Parliament might say, it was necessary for a court to decide for itself, using the vexed issue of proportionality as a separate assessment, it would seem. Paragraph 59 of the leading judgment describes the process of proportionality as a

“fact-specific inquiry which requires the evaluation of the circumstances in the individual case”.

There has been widespread criticism of the Ziegler case. The courts have been backing away from it—for example, the Colston statue case in the Court of Appeal and last week in two cases, R v ABJ and R v BDN. Policy Exchange, the think tank, has mounted a long-standing campaign against the incoherence that the Ziegler decision has generated. There is absolutely no reason, from Strasbourg’s point of view, why national Governments should not decide on the sensible and appropriate limits on the law in relation to protest. Many noble Lords will remember the 2023 legislation and the provisions concerning tunnelling, major obstruction to transport networks and interfering with key national infrastructure. I was always concerned that superimposing on all these very specific offences the defence of lawful or reasonable excuse without giving any definition was, in effect, simply asking courts, “Do you think that there was a reasonable excuse?” but not saying how they were to approach that issue. I tabled amendments, together with the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, without success, to clarify the issue so that courts could know what questions they should ask of themselves other than whether they liked the protest.

During the debate on this provision in Committee, no noble Lord from any party seemed to agree with the Ziegler decision or seek to defend it. The noble Lord, Lord Marks, seemed to dislike the amendment on one particular ground—that it purported to oust the jurisdiction of the European Court of Human Rights. I understand his loyalty towards the European Court of Human Rights, but the amendment does not seek to do that. It seeks to confirm that, in our view—I think that it is pretty uncontroversial—this amendment complies with the European Convention on Human Rights. It respects a balance of the various rights, and the House will know only too well that Articles 10 and 11 are qualified rights. It is clearly important that the law in relation to protests should take into account not only the rights of protesters but those of all those parties whose lives could be completely upset by the exercise of those rights and, of course, the police, who have to interpret the law and administrate the law, so coherence is most important.

I then looked again at what the noble Lord, Lord Hanson, had to say in response to this group. I want to be fair to the noble Lord, Lord Hanson, who has been indefatigable in the course of this Bill, dealing with any number of amendments, and often with large groups. I do not blame him altogether for not seizing on the Ziegler point with any great detail, but I fear that his answer was simply not good enough. He merely said

“the Government are not persuaded that this amendment is needed. Public order offences have been developed to ensure that those reasonable excuse defences apply only when appropriate and respect the need to balance”,—[Official Report, Commons, 13/1/26; col. 1634.]

et cetera. It was a perfectly fair statement of what the aims of any Government are but not an answer to the inadequacy of the Ziegler case. Therefore, I ask the Minister directly—sorry, it is not going to be the noble Lord, Lord Hanson, replying, as he is getting a well-earned rest, but the noble Lord, Lord Katz—whether he says, on behalf of the Government, that the Ziegler decision was correct, or does he accept, like almost any other legal commentator, that the decision was unfortunately wrong, as other judges seem now to accept? If that is the case, the law is incoherent, and it must be changed.

I fear I must join my noble friend Lord Pannick and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Goldsmith, who is not currently in his place, in saying that it is simply not good enough to say that we must wait until the noble Lord, Lord Macdonald, speaks on the subject—if he were to speak on the subject, because, of course, that may be some time in the future. Then there is the vexed question of legislative time.

We need to sort out the law in relation to protest. This amendment, whose drafting has not been criticised in any way, states what could or should constitute a reasonable excuse or lawful excuse. The time has come to clarify the law for everybody’s sake. I beg to move.

[Lord Hogan-Howe (CB)]

My Lords, I have added my name to my noble friend Lord Faulks’ amendment and I support it. To repeat a point I made on an earlier amendment, the police generally need simplicity, not complexity. Generally, Ziegler created complexity in what, in that case, was the simplest of offences. It was all about wilful obstruction of the highway. That used to be fairly straightforward. It was on a highway; it got obstructed and it was done wilfully: that was the offence. That is all that had to be proved. Of course, it is used not only in cases of protest, but Ziegler said that, in the case of protesters blocking the highway, that simple test could not be applied; it had to consider further issues. In fact, what it said was that the person could be convicted of obstructing the highway only if the prosecution could persuade the court that a conviction would be a proportionate interference in his or her convention rights, which, in effect, shifted it for the police to prove proportionality when someone was blocking the highway.

My point is that, although we understand the intellectual background to that, it has left the law in such a confused position that the cops do not know whether to enforce it at the moment of the crime. That is never a good position to be in. There is a secondary issue, which is that senior officers often become involved in planning for marches that are to happen in the next week or two weeks. They probably have a little bit more time to consider these issues, but frankly, the police have always used discretion. People block the highway fairly regularly; we all do. If you stop in your car, if you are walking on the highway, you can block it, so they do not arrest everybody who blocks the highway. They do not arrest every protester who is walking on the highway and clearly is obstructing it. That is what marchers do; it happens all the time. Of course, it becomes a bit tricky when a group within the protest decides to sit down in the middle of Oxford Circus and want to stay there for some time. That, I think we might all accept, is unreasonable. The police will try to persuade them. At some point, they might want to intervene and say, “Actually, I think you need to move or, alternatively, you are going to get arrested. There is a consequence to what you are doing. That’s your right, but there will be a consequence”.

I am afraid this judgment has left the police really confused. This is about obstruction of the highway, but it applies to all the different aspects of public order law. I do not think that it is fair to ask the police to start balancing human rights on the street. Of course, there is the issue of reasonableness, which is where discretion comes in—they are not going to arrest everybody and should exercise their powers only if somebody refuses to move or repeatedly causes an aggravation to the simple offence—but the danger of this judgment is that the law is confused and the police are caught in the middle. This amendment is an opportunity to clarify it. I think that is reasonable and I support it.

[Lord Pannick (CB)]

My Lords, criticism of the Ziegler decision is well-founded and well-taken, but the law has moved on. For example, in the Supreme Court’s abortion services case, 2022 UKSC 32, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Reed, speaking for a seven-judge Supreme Court, said at paragraph 42:

“The decision in Ziegler was widely understood as having established that every criminal conviction of protesters involved a restriction upon their Convention rights, and must be proved to be justified and proportionate on the basis of an assessment of the particular facts. As explained, that understanding was mistaken”.


The law has moved on.

As the noble Lord, Lord Faulks, recognised, there have been a number of more recent cases in which the courts emphasised, in the context of protest, that it is sufficient that Parliament has laid down a particular offence. It is therefore not necessary for the prosecution to prove proportionality on the facts of the individual case. It may well be that more clarity is required in this area, but the House should proceed on the recognition that Ziegler, for all its faults, is not current law.

[Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Faulks, for the elegant way that he introduced this amendment and the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, for explaining his perspective on it. In effect, it was a police perspective, given that the police find it difficult to apply the law as it was thought to be after Ziegler. I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, for explaining that the law has moved on since Ziegler.

I do not propose to get into the argument of precisely what the law is in the light of Ziegler as subsequently interpreted. I am concerned with the way that this amendment addresses the question of reasonable excuse. This is achieved by, in effect, spelling it out in proposed new subsection (2), which says:

“A person has no excuse for the conduct if … it is intended to intimidate, provoke, inconvenience or otherwise harm members of the public by interrupting or disrupting their freedom to carry on a lawful activity”.


That hides within it an open question about the meaning of intention in that context. It is for that reason that I do not support the amendment as drafted.

It may well be that a person recognises that conduct that is otherwise perfectly lawful, particularly in a context of peaceful protest, may inevitably carry the consequence of provoking or inconveniencing other members of the public by interrupting or disrupting their freedom to carry on a lawful activity. That comes back to the point that the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, made in the context of obstructing the highway. Any obstruction or interference with traffic or movement or getting to work, or any delay, could all be intended consequences of lawful protest. What worries me is that this amendment, as drafted, would acknowledge that intention and say that there could be no excuse. It is not then a question of weighing up any excuse in the light of what the courts may consider to be an excuse in any particular case; the question is what the intended consequence would be, and the intended consequence may appear to the people charged with the conduct to be entirely reasonable, though intended, and may objectively be entirely reasonable, though intended.

21:45

The position is made worse by proposed new subsection (3), which would provide that:

“It is immaterial that there are or may be other excuses or reasons for the conduct or that its main purpose may be different”.

The main purpose of a peaceable protest is to make a point. It may be, objectively, that making that point in a peaceable protest is a reasonable excuse for conduct that might amount to obstruction.

In a direct answer by the noble Lord, Lord Faulks, to the point I made in Committee about the ouster of the Human Rights Act, he suggested that I was wrong. In fact, proposed new subsection (5) can be read in no other way. It says that:

“For the purposes of the Human Rights Act 1998, this section must be treated as necessary in a democratic society for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others”.

The Human Rights Act provides that a restriction that is necessary for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others is or may be legitimate. If this proposed new subsection were to in effect outlaw the application of the Human Rights Act, it would be operating as an ouster. It would be predetermining the very issue that the Human Rights Act requires to be considered before restrictions are authorised by law.

Irrespective of any argument on Ziegler, I suggest that the effect of this proposed new clause as drafted is inconsistent with the Human Rights Act and is in fact a dangerous clause. The same goes for the proposed new clause that is specifically about the obstruction of the highway—it is part of the same argument in that narrow context. I take the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, that it is difficult to decide on, but, sometimes, the courts are there to decide difficult issues.

[Lord Davies of Gower (Con)]

My Lords, the recent ruling of the Supreme Court in R v ABJ and R v BDN has thrown the law of public protest into even greater confusion. That case relates to two protesters prosecuted under Section 12(1A) of the Terrorism Act 2000 for expressing public support for Hamas, a proscribed organisation. The appellants claimed that their charges under the Act represented a disproportionate interference with their right to freedom of expression under Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights. The Court unanimously dismissed this appeal and, in doing so, ruled that the Section 12(1A) offence in the Terrorism Act does not represent a disproportionate interference with the convention rights.

I raise this ruling because it highlights the confusion around protest law ever since the Supreme Court delivered a different ruling in the case of DPP v Ziegler in 2021. We have discussed the implications of the Ziegler ruling in this House on a number of occasions. Indeed, the noble Lord, Lord Faulks, has again reminded us of the details in that case. There is a clear tension between the court’s ruling in Ziegler and its ruling last week.

The court has made it clear that the Ziegler logic does not apply to the Terrorism Act defence but has not yet rectified the damaging consequences of the Ziegler decision. The basis of the court’s reasoning in Ziegler was the lawful excuse defence in Section 137 of the Highways Act 1980. In Committee, my noble friend Lord Cameron of Lochiel and I tabled amendments to remove the reasonable excuse defences from a number of Acts that are used to prosecute highly disruptive protesters, including the Highways Act and the Public Order Act 2023, and from this Bill.

When I spoke to those amendments, the Minister said that,

“the reasonable excuse defence is necessary in these instances to ensure an appropriate balance between protecting the wider community and the right to protest”.—[Official Report, 13/1/26; col. 1633.]

It is clear that the balance has not been made. I have not tabled those amendments to remove the reasonable excuse defences again, apart from Amendment 377B, which would remove the reasonable excuse defence from Section 137 of the Highways Act. I can think of no possible excuse for anyone purposefully to block the highway unless they are authorised to do so, such as the police or officers of National Highways. Removing that defence would render the issue in Ziegler null and void since that defence was the issue under consideration by the court.

However, I accept that the problem has now grown. The Supreme Court’s decision in the Ziegler case means there is now judicial precedent, and defence lawyers up and down the country have been lining up to utilise that argument so their clients can get off scot free. That is why I will be supporting Amendment 377 from the noble Lord, Lord Faulks. While I would prefer to remove those defences entirely, it would be better that the clarity in the law provided by Amendment 377 was made. His amendment would apply more widely than mine and therefore, I am happy to admit, provides a more substantial solution to the problem.

I would like to pick up on something that the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, said in Committee:

“much of the criticism of Ziegler fails to recognise that the courts themselves have understood that Ziegler went too far, and that what Parliament has determined in relation to the law is the governing law”.—[Official Report, 13/1/26; col. 1623.]

I accept his interpretation that the courts by subsequent decisions have recognised the issue of Ziegler, but the decision in Ziegler still stands as case law. It has not yet been overturned. I think that serves as one of the strongest arguments for Parliament to pass Amendment 377 and rectify the error that the courts have themselves acknowledged.

If the European Convention on Human Rights prevents the application of the law as passed by Parliament or prevents the conviction of those who should be convicted, that demonstrates that we should leave the ECHR, but while we remain within the purview of the Strasbourg court and while the Human Rights Act remains on the statute book, the decision in Ziegler needs to be reversed. Therefore, if the noble Lord, Lord Faulks, wishes to divide the House on Amendment 377, he will have our full support.

[Lord in Waiting/Government Whip (Lord Katz) (Lab)]

My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords who took part in this short but important debate, and I am grateful to the noble Lords, Lord Faulks and Lord Davies of Gower, for tabling these amendments which seek to narrow the existing lawful or reasonable excuse defences that may be used for public order offences.

It may be helpful to set out how a lawful excuse works in practice. A person is automatically treated as having a lawful excuse only under two specific circumstances. The first is if the defendant honestly believes that the person who is entitled to consent to the damage has given consent or would have consented if they knew of the circumstances—for example, an honest belief that the owner of a car in which a child was locked on a hot day consented, or would have consented, to the defendant smashing the window to get the child out. The second is if the defendant acts to protect their own or someone else’s property and they honestly believe both that the property needs immediate protection and that their actions are reasonable—for example, a person damages one person’s property while accessing the property of another to prevent a fire. It does not matter whether a person’s belief in those circumstances is reasonable or justified; it just needs to be honest.

Whatever the failings of, or, indeed, one’s views on, the Ziegler judgment, as the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, said in his sagacious contribution, case law has moved on and the Supreme Court has made subsequent rulings which chart a clearer path. It is the case that the right to private property will always need to be balanced with other convention rights, such as the right to protest and freedom of expression. This will have to be judged on a case-by-case basis, but leading case law has set out the parameters, and the Court of Appeal did not say that the exercise of a person’s convention rights could never form the basis of lawful excuse for criminal damage.

While I acknowledge the concerns of noble Lords, I have a great deal of sympathy for the arguments advanced by the noble Lord, Lord Marks. It is for the Crown Prosecution Service and the courts to decide what may constitute lawful or reasonable excuse in individual cases. Further, the current scope of the defence allows the CPS the necessary flexibility to consider the full circumstances of each case on its merits. The types of behaviour that noble Lords have suggested, such as intimidating or harming members of the public or the risk of damaging property, are unlikely to be considered a reasonable excuse. Therefore, I ask the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Faulks (Non-Afl)]

I am grateful to all those who took part in this debate. I think the issues have rather narrowed between those who have taken part in it. For the first time during the course of these debates on this issue, we had some drafting points from the noble Lord, Lord Marks. They have come late, but none the less I will deal with them.

The first point is that the noble Lord did not like my proposed provision that says that it is not an excuse if you intend

“to intimidate, provoke, inconvenience or otherwise harm members of the public by interrupting or disrupting their freedom to carry on a lawful activity”.

That does not seem to be a very reasonable excuse to me, so it seems a very sensible thing to put in the amendment.

Secondly, the noble Lord did not like subsection (3), where it says that it is immaterial that there may be other purposes. If the defendant does not have a good excuse, it is no good saying, “My overall excuse, because I happen to support Just Stop Oil, is a good one”. You cannot rely on that.

In his final point, the noble Lord stuck to his argument that this was an attempt to oust the jurisdiction of the Human Rights Act 1998. I repeat the point that it is not that. Whatever the future may hold, we are still part of the European Convention on Human Rights. But the convention requires the balancing of rights, including that they have to be treated as necessary in a democratic society for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others. This provision reflects all those factors in a perfectly appropriate balance. Therefore, it complies with the European Convention on Human Rights.

I come finally to this point. The noble Lord, Lord Pannick, quite rightly said, pointing to a recent judgment of the President of the Supreme Court, that the courts are backing away from Ziegler. I am not surprised. It sits very uneasily with the jurisprudence in this area generally. The decision is almost moribund. But it is time to give it a decent burial. It is time to conclude that the law should be clear, that we can understand what it means and that the police can understand what it means, so that the whole business of putting forward spurious excuses will cease and we can have a proper and sensible law in relation to protest. I wish to test the opinion of the House.

21:57

Division 4

Amendment 377 disagreed.

Ayes: 82

Noes: 151

22:07

Amendments 377A and 377B not moved.

Amendment 377C

Moved by

[Lord Davies of Gower]

377C: After Clause 142, insert the following new Clause—
“Extension of notice period for public processions(1) Section 11 of the Public Order Act 1986 (advance notice of public processions) is amended as follows.(2) In subsection (5) for “6” substitute “28”.(3) In subsection (6) for “6” substitute “28”.”Member's explanatory statement
This amendment would extend the notice period that is required for public processions to take place from 6 to 28 days.

[Lord Davies of Gower (Con)]

My Lords, this amendment seeks to extend the notice period for public processions from six days to 28 days. The Government have resisted this; however, the police feel that it is difficult to operate under the current system and would prefer that it was 28 days as opposed to six. On that basis, I think we should be supporting the police, and I beg to test the opinion of the House.

22:08

Division 5

Amendment 377C disagreed.

Ayes: 76

Noes: 185

22:19

Amendment 377D

Moved by

[Lord Davies of Gower]

377D: After Clause 142, insert the following new Clause—
“Prohibition of protests(1) Section 13 of the Public Order Act 1986 (prohibiting public processions) is amended as follows.(2) For subsection (1) substitute—“(1) The chief officer of police may apply to the Secretary of State for an order to prohibit the holding of all public processions (or any class of public processions so specified) for a period of not more than 3 months in any district or part of a district if either of the following conditions are met.(1A) The first condition is that the chief officer of police reasonably believes that the powers under section 12 will not be sufficient to prevent a public procession in the district or part of the district from resulting in –(a) serious public disorder,(b) serious damage to property, or(c) serious disruption to the life of the community.(1B) The second condition is that the procession would place undue demands on the police.”(3) In subsection (2)—(a) omit “a council may with the consent of”;(b) after the first “Secretary of State” insert “may”.”

[Lord Davies of Gower (Con)]

My Lords, this amendment relates to the prohibition of protests, where the chief officer may apply to the Secretary of State for an order to prohibit the holding of all public processions, and where he or she considers there may be serious public disorder, damage to property or, indeed, serious disruption to the life of a community. That is an eminently sensible amendment, and the Government have resisted this again. However, I feel that it would be a great tool in the box for police, so I look to divide the House on it.

22:20

Division 6

Amendment 337D disagreed.

Ayes: 68

Noes: 183

22:30

Clause 154: Access to driver licensing information

Amendments 378 and 379

Moved by

[Lord Hanson of Flint]

378: Clause 154, page 200, line 19, leave out from beginning to “for” and insert—
“(1) The Criminal Justice and Court Services Act 2000 is amended as follows.Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment is consequential on my amendment to clause 154, page 205, line 6.

379: Clause 154, page 201, line 13, at end insert—
“(5A) The requirement in subsection (5) may be satisfied by consultation carried out wholly or partly before this section comes into force.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment provides that the Secretary of State’s duty to consult before making regulations under section 71 of the Criminal Justice and Court Services Act 2000 (inserted by clause 154) may be satisfied by pre-commencement consultation.

Amendments 378 and 379 agreed.

Amendment 380

Moved by

[Baroness Doocey]

380: Clause 154, page 201, line 24, at end insert—
“(7A) Authorised persons listed in section 71A may not use the information referenced in subsection (1) for the purposes of biometric searches using facial recognition technology.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment ensures that the DVLA database cannot be used for searches using live facial recognition.

[Baroness Doocey (LD)]

My Lords, Amendment 380 erects a vital safeguard. It blocks Clause 154 from handing millions of drivers’ private photos to the police for facial recognition searches without full parliamentary scrutiny and explicit consent. It stops a road traffic database being quietly repurposed for mass biometric surveillance, while still allowing proportionate, tightly regulated data sharing for genuine policing needs.

In Committee, Peers from across the House voiced concerns echoing not just the Liberal Democrats but a wide range of civil society groups, among them Liberty, Big Brother Watch, Justice, StopWatch, Inquest and Privacy International. The Minister still tells us that this is merely a tidying-up exercise with no impact on facial recognition, but the evidence tells a very different story. It points to a plan to funnel photos of over 50 million innocent drivers into a vast facial recognition repository, dismantling vital privacy safeguards.

For anyone who thinks that sounds exaggerated, let me make three points. First, the previous Government explicitly justified an almost identical clause on the basis that it would enable facial recognition searches; they were candid about that intention. If this Government do not share that purpose, they should have no difficulty supporting my amendment.

Secondly, thanks to freedom of information requests, we now know that other civic databases, passports and immigration records are already acting as de facto facial recognition libraries, without public knowledge, consent or a clear parliamentary mandate.

Thirdly, there is a strategic facial match-up project—a joint Home Office and police scheme—to enable facial recognition searches across multiple databases, including non-policing ones. Its existence has yet to be confirmed in public Home Office policy documents, having surfaced only via government tender notices, media reports and oblique spending references. If this project does not exist, I invite the Minister to set the record straight.

Facial recognition turns an ordinary photograph into biometric data, a unique identifier like a fingerprint or DNA, which in law should be retained for criminal justice purposes only under very strict safeguards. The UK does not currently have population-wide biometric databases of innocent citizens. Creating a single, easily accessible policing platform for these civil images runs directly against the European Court of Human Rights’ warning that blanket retention of biometrics is a serious and disproportionate interference with privacy. Plugging the DVLA database into a facial recognition engine also risks creating a honeypot for hostile states and criminals, exposing the lifelong biometric signatures of almost every adult driver.

There are practical problems as well. Driving licence photos are updated only every 10 years, so the database already holds millions of outdated images. Using that kind of so-called “noisy data” for facial recognition inevitably increases the risk of false positives and wrongful stops. We know that this technology is far less precise than DNA and has already contributed to wrongful accusations, yet we are assured that its accuracy is improving. However, there is no timescale for this. The Government are, in effect, asking Parliament to sign a blank cheque for mass access to our biometric data. Amendment 380 simply asks this House not to hand them the pen. I beg to move.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I know a young man who has just got his driving licence. He is very excited and sees it as a rite of passage; he is now a grown-up. He has joined the club of drivers and he shows his driving licence with pride. I can assure noble Lords he has no idea that applying for a driving licence means that he is joining a vast biometric police database, a club of police surveillance, and his mugshot will be treated like one of those Most Wanted gallery of rogues images.

This is a corruption of public trust. The public apply for one thing, only for it to be subverted and used for something else. It seems to me to be duplicitous and behind the backs of the public. Currently, police forces can directly access and search DVLA data only in relation to road traffic offences and must phone the DVLA in relation to other offences. I note that the amendment from the noble Baroness, Lady Doocey, would not prevent police forces accessing DVLA data for law enforcement purposes, but it should not be the default position. It is important to create this safeguard to prevent such data being used to conduct, in effect, phishing exercises of facial recognition. Therefore, we need this amendment to be taken seriously and I will be interested in what the Minister has to say.

This is not some paranoid dystopian vision. In a recent submission to the Home Affairs Committee, the National Police Chiefs’ Council stated that police chiefs were indeed seeking access to the DVLA database for facial recognition. That would be a huge expansion of police surveillance powers, granting them access, as we have heard, to the biometric data of tens of millions of citizens. We cannot overestimate how important it is that we do not just nod this through but take seriously the risk to civil liberties. It is why the noble Baroness’s Amendment 380, which creates a safeguard, is so important: to protect the civil liberties and privacy of innocent driving licence holders.

I conclude with a quote from Big Brother Watch, which says that this represents

“a disproportionate expansion of police powers to track and identify citizens across time and locations for low-level policing needs”.

In a way, it is an abuse of the police to ask them to use these underhand methods, and it is therefore vital that there are safeguards in law to prevent this happening, particularly because it is happening behind the backs of ordinary people.

[Lord Pannick (CB)]

There is no question, as I understand Clause 154, of a blank cheque, and there is no question here of underhand methods. What the clause requires is that the Secretary of State produces regulations, and the regulations must specify the circumstances in which information may be made available under this section. I am assuming that in due course, the Government are going to bring forward regulations to implement this provision. Those regulations will have to be laid before Parliament, and there will be an opportunity, if any noble Lord wishes to do so, to debate those regulations. I suggest that that is the time to assess whether the regulations contain a fair balance between the rights of the individual and the public interest.

[Lord Strasburger (LD)]

My Lords, the DVLA driver database must not be turned into a ready-made line-up for facial recognition systems. This is about more than data protection; it is about the basic relationship between citizen and state. People did not hand over their photographs to the DVLA so that the Government could quietly repurpose them for mass identification; they did so under legal compulsion to get a driving licence.

Using those images to power facial recognition searches fundamentally changes the deal after the fact. It turns a compulsory single-purpose database into an all-purpose surveillance tool, without anyone ever having given meaningful consent. Once you allow the police to run facial recognition matches against the DVLA database, you create the possibility of identifying almost anyone, almost anywhere, from a single image. That goes far beyond investigating named suspects. It enables trawling through the entire driving population to find possible matches, with all the risk of false positives that facial recognition systems already carry. A bad match here is not an abstract error. It is a real person, wrongly flagged, questioned or even arrested, because a machine thought their face looked similar.

The DVLA database is also nearly universal for adults. That makes it uniquely tempting. If we normalise using it for facial recognition in one context, it will not stop there. Today, it might be justified for serious crime. Tomorrow, it could creep into protests, public events or routine inquiries. Once the precedent is set that every licence holder’s image is fair game for search, the barrier to expanding that use becomes paper-thin.

There is also a democratic principle at stake here. When the state wants new investigative powers that are this sweeping, it should come to Parliament and ask for them openly, with clear limits, safeguards and independent oversight. What must not happen is a quiet, technical integration between the facial recognition system and the DVLA database, introduced by secondary legislation and governed mainly by internal policies and obscure memoranda of understanding. This is legislation by the backdoor, not by debate.

If we allow the DVLA database to be searched with facial recognition, we are not just making investigations a little more efficient; we are rebuilding the basic infrastructure of our democracy so that the state can, in principle, put a name to almost any face. We are doing that using images people had no real choice about providing, and for a completely different purpose. So, the line we should draw is simple and firm: the DVLA driver database is for licensing drivers, not for powering facial recognition line-ups. If any Government want to change that, they must come back to Parliament with primary legislation, make their case in public and accept strict statutory constraints. Until then, we should say clearly that turning a compulsory licensing database into a de facto national ID gallery is a step too far for a free society. That is what Amendment 380 does and I commend it to the House.

[Lord Hogan-Howe (CB)]

My Lords, I do not support the amendment. The noble Lord, Lord Pannick, made the point that there will obviously be regulations, because people do have fears about accessing the DVLA database.

At the moment, the only database that facial comparisons are made against is that of suspects, which is a substantial database of people the police have arrested in the past. It would be a bizarre outcome if the technology existed to find a serial rapist and the only way we could find them was on the DVLA database, but we buried our head in the sand and said that we were not going to look. This is just the start of an investigation, not a conclusion. No one would get charged as a result of being identified by this process, but it may well start an investigation that might exclude or include them. To not take up the possibility that you could identify them, either through the DVLA or other databases, is the wrong way forward.

22:45

Of course, initially it should probably be restricted to serious crimes, but the alternative of ignoring it seems bizarre, given that most places we go to now have CCTV cameras. Generally, the present method of identification is showing the image around a police station and saying, “Do you know them?” Frankly, it does not work in London, but where technology exists to make that a more efficient and effective process, it honestly would be foolish to ignore it. But I do agree that it should be regulated. What those regulations should be is a matter for debate, but to exclude the possibility altogether is wrong.

[Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, said that the fact that this access is to be authorised by regulations is a saving grace. We know full well that in this House, fatal Motions virtually never succeed. The Conservative Front Bench may take some comfort from the fact that there would be provision for regulations, but the reality is that once the enabling legislation is passed, regulations will be in the hands of the Government, and nobody can do anything about it.

This is an issue of consent. People who apply for driving licences do so and have done so for many years on the basis that their photographs and biometric data are provided for the limited purpose of applying for a driving licence—that goes for all the information they provide. It is not for the purpose of enabling a trawl for suspects. One can envisage a position where, in some circumstances, authorisation to use information in public hands, as the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, suggested, may be appropriate, but this is not the place for it to be provided for by regulations subsequent to and consequent upon this enabling clause.

It is a question of public trust. The information and photographs are provided by applicants for driving licences based on the trust that they will be used for that purpose and that purpose alone. To misuse that information to enable a trawl of photographs to see if they might be suspected of some offence, with nobody having any real control over that use, is an abuse of trust. For that reason, I support the amendment.

[Lord Davies of Gower (Con)]

My Lords, I will address Amendment 380 in the names of the noble Baronesses, Lady Doocey and Lady Moulsecoomb, and the noble Lords, Lord Clement-Jones and Lord Strasburger. I am grateful to them for raising an issue that deserves careful consideration. The amendment would prevent authorised persons using information held on the Driving and Vehicle Licensing Agency database for biometric searches using facial recognition technology. It is right to ensure that Parliament scrutinises these emerging powers thoroughly. Public trust in policing is vital, and it is only through open debate and clear safeguards that such trust can be maintained.

The DVLA database contains photographs and personal information provided by millions of law-abiding citizens for the specific purpose of licensing drivers, and it is therefore entirely understandable that noble Lords should question whether it is appropriate for that information to be used in other contexts, particularly the context of advanced biometric searches. The principle that personal data should not be repurposed without clear justification is one that many of us across the House share.

However, while the concerns behind this amendment are sincere and valid, I fear that it is unnecessary and ultimately misguided. It would risk undermining the ability of our police and law enforcement agencies to prevent and investigate serious crime. First, it is important to recognise the operational value that carefully regulated facial recognition tools can provide to modern policing. The technology, when used responsibly, can assist officers in identifying suspects in serious crime, locating dangerous offenders and protecting the public in situations where time is of the essence. It can be particularly valuable when investigating crimes involving unidentified individuals captured on CCTV or other images.

The police already rely on a range of databases and identification tools to perform these tasks. Photographs from custody suites, passport records and other lawful sources have long assisted the police in identifying suspects and victims alike. Facial recognition technology represents in many ways a technological evolution of that long-standing investigative practice. The amendment before us would place a blanket prohibition on the use of DVLA images for biometric searches involving facial recognition. Such prohibition risks creating an artificial and potentially harmful limitation on investigative capability. If a suspect’s image appears on CCTV and the only high-quality image available for comparison is contained within a DVLA database, the amendment would prevent police even conducting that comparison. We must ask ourselves whether that is a proportionate outcome.

Secondly, it is worth emphasising that the use of facial recognition technology by police forces in the United Kingdom is not taking place in a regulatory vacuum. The deployment of such technologies is already subject to a framework of legal safeguards, oversight and guidance. Police forces must operate within the boundaries of data protection law, including the principles established under the UK general data protection regulation and the Data Protection Act 2018. Their activities are subject to oversight by bodies such as the Information Commissioner’s Office and, where appropriate, the courts. Moreover, the use of live facial recognition by police has already been subject to significant judicial scrutiny. The courts have made it clear that deployments must be proportionate and transparent, and accompanied by appropriate safeguards. That jurisprudence has helped shape operational guidance and policing practice in this area.

Given that context, I question whether it is wise for Parliament to impose a sweeping statutory ban in relation to one database. Doing so risks pre-empting the careful regulatory balance that is already evolving through legislation, oversight and case law. That does not mean that the concerns raised by the amendment should be dismissed—far from it. The growth of biometric technologies demands a clear and robust legislative framework. Many Members across this House have rightly called for greater clarity about how facial recognition should be governed in the future. I feel the same. Questions of transparency, accountability, accuracy and bias must continue to be examined with great care.

However, those broader questions should be addressed through a comprehensive approach to biometric governance rather than through a single amendment targeting one database in isolation. If Parliament concludes that additional statutory safeguards are required for facial recognition technology then we should consider them holistically, ensuring that any rules are consistent, proportionate and grounded in operational reality. A piecemeal prohibition risks creating unintended consequences while failing to resolve the underlying policy debate.

For those reasons, while I commend the spirit in which the amendment has been brought forward, I regret that I cannot support it. Instead, I hope that the House will continue the broader necessary conversation about how facial recognition technologies should be regulated, ensuring that we protect civil liberties and the ability of our police to keep our communities safe.

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

My Lords, this has been a useful debate. I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Doocey, for tabling the amendment, and to the noble Lord, Lord Strasburger, and the noble Baroness, Lady Fox, for speaking in support of it. I am grateful for the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Gower, which echo some of the points that I will make. The noble Lord, Lord Pannick, pointed to one of the arguments that I will make: that access to the data will be subject to a statutory code of practice to ensure that its use is appropriate.

I remind noble Lords of the purpose of Clause 154: it is simply about bringing legislation up to date, which is what I said in Committee when we debated this matter. As a result of technical changes to the way police and law enforcement access driving licence data, it has become clear that we need to improve the DVLA data access regime by setting out clearly in statute—which is what Clause 154 does—which persons can access DVLA driving licence data. The legislation provides additional clarity on this issue.

The measure will enable us, through secondary legislation made under these new powers—this goes to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Pannick—to expand the purposes for which DVLA data may be accessed automatically to include policing or law enforcement purposes. This means that the police will have another tool to cut crime and keep the public safe, in line with the commitment by chief officers to pursue all reasonable lines of inquiry when investigating an offence. I emphasise that access to the data will be subject to a statutory code of practice to ensure that its use is appropriate.

We are clear that there will be strong safeguards around the use of DVLA data, which, as I have said, will be introduced via regulations made under the new provisions. We debated earlier government Amendment 382, which ensures that these regulations are subject to the affirmative procedure in both Houses, in line with a recommendation from the Constitution Committee.

We want to ensure that officers undergo training prior to being able to access information. The police are already legally required to consult with local communities. Extensive audits of who has accessed DVLA driving licence data are maintained. It is already standard practice that each time the DVLA driver database is accessed by a police officer, the details of what information is accessed and for what purpose is logged. This will continue to be the case once the revised measure is implemented.

On the issue of facial recognition technology, I want to make it clear to all noble Lords who have signed this amendment, including the noble Baroness, Lady Doocey, that police forces do not conduct biometric facial recognition searches against images contained on the DVLA database. Officers use the DVLA database for day-to-day policing matters. Anybody who has watched a police programme on a Monday night—when they get the opportunity in the recess to do so—will have at some point seen a police officer pull over a car and look at an individual who says, “I haven’t got my licence with me”, and tell them they are Jimmy Jones of X address. The police officer then wants to check that they are Jimmy Jones of X address, and so they access the DVLA database. Nine times out of 10, on the police shows that I watch on a Monday night during recess, it is a false name, and therefore there is police action accordingly. That is the purpose for which the police currently use the database.

As I said in our earlier debate on Amendment 374, the use of facial recognition technology in all circumstances is currently subject to safeguards, such as the Human Rights Act and the Data Protection Act. As I have said in previous discussions, any use of facial recognition technology will be subject to the outcome of the consultation that we finished on 10 February. That will be completed in about 12 weeks and, by the summer, we will have government proposals which the noble Baroness, along with both Houses of Parliament, can scrutinise, to achieve some view on whatever the Government propose following the outcome of that consultation.

I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Gower, that, if the amendment were agreed by the Government tonight then the police officer who stopped somebody on the street—potentially a drunk driver, an unlicensed driver or a driver with no insurance—would not be able to access the DVLA database. That goes to the very points that the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, made in his speech.

This is not about mass surveillance. It is about using the DVLA database in an appropriate way—logged, recorded and monitored by the police to ensure that we check that person A is actually the right person who can drive that vehicle at that particular time. It is not, with due respect to noble Lords, mass surveillance. It is proper use of police technology to ensure that the DVLA database helps catch bad actors in the act of doing bad things. I hope the noble Baroness will withdraw her amendment.

[Baroness Doocey (LD)]

My Lords, there is no chance at all that I am going to withdraw the amendment, but I think the Minister knows that. We are not on the same page on this. How on earth can the Government justify taking information that people have given for one purpose and using it for something else? It is totally and utterly disgraceful. People have given their photographs to get a driving licence; it is wrong that they can now be repurposed to be checked by police. Just let me finish the sentence. There is nothing wrong with the Government, in their consultation, saying to people, “We want to repurpose the DVLA driving licence database because it would be really helpful to police. Would you be willing to agree to this?”, but they did not say that. They have just taken it.

23:00

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

Does the noble Baroness think that a police officer, at 11 pm, on a street here in Westminster, should not access the DVLA database to check that the person is who they say they are? If she thinks that, she would really be blowing a hole in every Monday night television programme that I have ever watched.

[Baroness Doocey (LD)]

I suggest that the Minister has been watching too many of these television programmes. There is a complete lack of transparency. The Information Commissioner’s Office had to learn about the use of passport databases through media reports, rather than Home Office disclosure, even though this appears to have been happening since 2019. It is just so completely and utterly wrong. If people had given their information for it be used for those purposes, it would be fair enough and no problem at all, but they did not and the Government have taken it without permission. The whole situation is absolutely appalling.

There is the potential for 50 million drivers to be put on a permanent database and to be checked every single day. Of course, the police want it; I would want it if I were the police. It will make their lives so much easier. It will make it very easy for them to check everything they need to check, but that should not be the purpose of this.

[Lord Pannick (CB)]

The noble Baroness is very eloquently making her case on the basis of a lack of consent. I suggest to her that the police regularly use material that people have not given their consent for them to use—for example, their fingerprints and saliva.

[Baroness Doocey (LD)]

I do not accept that that is the same as 50 million innocent drivers being put on a database. However, I have given all the arguments and we have had this debate twice. The noble Lord is gesturing. I am sorry; what does that mean?

[Lord Katz (Lab)]

I was simply saying that, as the noble Baroness has already indicated that she is going to divide the House and given the hour, it would probably be quite useful just to go to that stage.

[Baroness Doocey (LD)]

I think that is very unfair, because my speeches are probably shorter than those of anybody in this House. The noble Lord should not pick on me because he does not like what I am saying. I do not like being bullied.

I do not believe that what the Government are doing is right and I would like to test the opinion of the House.

23:03

Division 7

Amendment 380 disagreed.

Ayes: 40

Noes: 123

23:14

Amendments 381 and 382

Moved by

[Lord Hanson of Flint]

381: Clause 154, page 204, line 23, at end insert—
“(3A) The requirement in subsection (3) may be satisfied by consultation carried out wholly or partly before this section comes into force.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment provides that the Secretary of State’s duty to consult in preparing a code of practice under section 71B of the Criminal Justice and Court Services Act 2000 (inserted by clause 154) may be satisfied by pre-commencement consultation.

382: Clause 154, page 205, line 6, at end insert—
“(3) In section 76 (subordinate legislation), after subsection (5) insert—“(5A) A statutory instrument containing regulations under section 71 may not be made unless a draft of the instrument has been laid before and approved by a resolution of each House of Parliament.””Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment provides for regulations made by the Secretary of State under section 71 of the Criminal Justice and Court Services Act 2000 (inserted by clause 154) to be subject to affirmative resolution procedure.

Amendments 381 and 382 agreed.

Amendment 383

Moved by

[Lord Hanson of Flint]

383: After Clause 154, insert the following new Clause—
“Code of practice relating to non-criminal hate incidentsIn the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022, omit—(a) sections 60 and 61 (code of practice about police processing of personal data relating to hate incidents), and(b) the italic heading before section 60.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment repeals sections 60 and 61 of the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022.

[Lord Hanson of Flint]

My Lords, I beg to move Amendment 383, which repeals the statutory code relating to non-crime hate incidents issued under Sections 60 and 61 of the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022. Consideration of the review undertaken by the College of Policing and the National Police Chiefs’ Council has shown that to be the appropriate policy to take forward. The interim findings of the review commissioned, in conjunction with the College of Policing, by the former Home Secretary were published in October. They were clear that the existing system no longer operates as intended and should be replaced with a clearer, more proportionate model.

Non-crime hate incidents were originally introduced following the landmark Stephen Lawrence inquiry. Their intent—to gather information to prevent crime, support investigations and safeguard the vulnerable—remains as relevant today as it did 30 years ago, and we remain committed to safeguarding against hostility and collecting information to support an effective policing response. However, the environment in which policing operates has evolved significantly since that inquiry and over time non-crime hate incidents have expanded beyond their original intention. The growth of social media in particular and online polarisation has drawn the police into disputes that fall outside their core duties. Police officers must be able to focus on catching criminals, cutting crime and ensuring public safety, and the present statutory code has not provided the clarity needed to support that focus. It must therefore be revoked.

The College of Policing—I am pleased to see its chair, the noble Lord, Lord Herbert, in his place—and the National Police Chiefs’ Council are clear that the current system is not fit for purpose. They intend to set out a more appropriate framework that ensures that recording is proportionate, clearer and firmly focused on the most serious incidents to ensure the police are not drawn into matters they should not be drawn into. It will do this by tightening the definition of an incident, raising the recording threshold, moving from recording all incidents that are a cause for concern to capturing only those that relate to core policing purposes. These reforms will be supported by robust guidance and training so that the incidents are handled appropriately. The new framework has been developed by police experts in consultation with community representatives. It will, I believe, strike the right balance between safeguarding vulnerable communities and protecting lawful freedom of expression by ensuring that recording is consistent and focused on genuine risk.

The amendment before the House today repeals the statutory framework to facilitate the introduction of a new framework. Commencement will be timed to ensure an orderly transition aligned with the introduction of the replacement framework. As I have indicated to the House previously, further detail will be set out following the publication of the college’s final report, which I expect in very short order in the coming weeks. The report is going to the National Police Chiefs’ Council for consideration next week and I expect it to be published by the College of Policing shortly afterwards.

Amendment 383 will end a system that policing experts agree no longer works. However, the original intention behind non-crime hate incidents to help prevent crime and safeguard the vulnerable remains important. Our commitment to tackling hate remains, as witnessed by the amendments we brought forward last week that were approved by this House, but the mechanism by which the police assess and record information will change, with a higher threshold for police involvement. We will continue to safeguard our communities but through a clearer, more proportionate framework that works. When that is brought forward, I will make sure that the results are published and that noble Lords, as well as Members of the House of Commons, can see the outcome of that final report once the National Police Chiefs’ Council has issued it for clearance. The amendment enables the changes that I have explained.

I will respond to Amendment 387B, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Young, once I have heard noble Lords, but for now I beg to move the amendment.

[Lord Young of Acton (Con)]

My Lords, I support Amendment 387B. I declare my interest as a director of the Free Speech Union.

I am grateful to the Minister for summarising the final report of the College of Policing and the National Police Chiefs’ Council on non-crime hate incidents, for the courtesy he has shown me and the co-sponsors of this amendment in the run-up to this debate, and for arranging for me and others to be briefed by Sir Andy Marsh and his team at the College of Policing about the recommendations in the final report, which I will get to shortly.

As I made clear to the House in Committee, I have long-standing concerns that the investigation and recording of non-crime hate incidents has been a huge waste of police time and had a chilling effect on free speech. According to a report for Policy Exchange published in November 2024, police in England and Wales are spending an estimated 60,000 hours a year investigating and recording NCHIs—non-crimes. That is time that could be spent solving actual crimes. Based on FoI requests submitted by the Telegraph and others, the Free Speech Union estimates that over a quarter of a million NCHIs have been recorded since they were first introduced in 2014, and that is in England and Wales alone. That is an average of more than 65 a day.

Why so many? Because if a hate incident is reported to the police by a member of the public, they have little choice but to record it as an NCHI. All that is required is that the victim, or indeed any witness, believes that the incident in question was motivated by hostility towards one or more of the victim’s protected characteristics. No additional evidence is required. Examples include a man accused of whistling the theme tune to “Bob the Builder” whenever he saw his neighbour, a woman who said on social media she thought her cat was a Methodist, and two schoolgirls who told another girl in the school playground that she smelled like fish.

It is hard not to laugh, but for the people who have had NCHIs recorded against them it is no laughing matter. If you apply for a position or a voluntary role that requires you to carry out an enhanced Disclosure and Barring Service check, an NCHI can show up on your record. That is why I say that NCHIs have had a chilling effect on free speech. People are rightly concerned that, if they say something that another person takes offence at, it can permanently blot their copybook and may prevent them getting a job as a teacher or a carer, or volunteering at a charity like the Samaritans. There is also the broader concern that the amount of time the police are spending on investigating and recording non-crimes is undermining public confidence in the police.

That is why I welcome the recommendations that the Minister has shared with us. It sounds like we have finally seen the back of NCHIs—something that the Free Speech Union has been campaigning for for six years now. Assuming that the National Police Chiefs’ Council and the Secretary of State sign off on these proposals, the kind of incidents that were recorded as NCHIs in the past will in future be recorded, as I understand it, as anti-social behaviour incidents, and only those that meet the higher threshold—that is, that recording the incident is considered necessary for the prevention or detection of a crime or for another policing purpose, and it complies with the new recording guidance.

I am particularly encouraged by what we have heard about the new guidance. We have been assured that it will have due regard to the right to freedom of expression and in that way, we hope, protect the police from being dragged into bad-tempered arguments on social media as well as petty disputes between neighbours. In future, if someone calls a control room to complain about a supposedly offensive remark they have seen on Twitter or overheard across the garden fence, the call handler can say, “I’m sorry, but that’s not a policing matter”. That is all to the good, and I take this opportunity to congratulate the College of Policing and the National Police Chiefs’ Council on producing such a sensible report. This is a welcome dose of common sense that I hope will go some way to restoring public confidence in the police.

Nevertheless, I do not intend not to press the amendment. Our amendment would not prevent the police recording incidents where doing so served a legitimate policing purpose, even in some circumstances logging those incidents on an intelligent management system. Noble Lords, including the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, raised concerns about that during the debate in Committee, and we have adapted our amendment accordingly.

To be clear, this amendment will not prevent the police recording incidents involving a hate element for intelligence-gathering purposes. However, I still have concerns that historic NCHIs could show up in enhanced DBS checks. That is why proposed subsection (5) in this amendment says that the police must not disclose historic NCHIs that would not meet the new higher recording thresholds. I think your Lordships would agree that data entries that would not be made under the new regime, but which are hanging around on police computers, must not be disclosed in enhanced DBS checks.

I have reluctantly come to accept that asking the police to comb through their databases and delete historic NCHIs that would not meet the new recording threshold would be too resource-intensive because of the sheer number that had been recorded, and that demand no longer appears in our amendment. Nevertheless, proposed subsection (5) says that any NCHIs that police come across that would not be recorded under the new regime must be deleted. I do not think that is a big ask, and it would enable people who believe NCHIs have been recorded against their names—trivial incidents that would not be recorded under the new criteria—to ask the police to delete them.

I welcome the assurance that the new recording guidance will have due regard to the right to freedom of expression, but, in the absence of putting any of these recommendations in statute, what guarantee do we have that the College of Policing, under new leadership, or a different Home Secretary, would not dispense with that requirement? Consequently, proposed subsection (4) in the amendment says:

“Guidance in relation to incident recording must have due regard to … freedom of expression”.


That brings me to a broader point. As I understand it, the Government’s plans for taking forward these recommendations—assuming they are signed off—is to include them in guidance, but not statute. The government amendment in this group will repeal the statutory basis for the current NCHI regime, thereby clearing the ground for a new regime to spring up in its place. But that new regime will be wholly reliant on guidance. I do not doubt the Minister will do what he has said he will do with the full support of my noble friend Lord Herbert, the chair of the College of Policing, Sir Andy Marsh the CEO and the chief constables on the national council. But what about their successors? What happens if a more authoritarian Government replace the current one?

The only way to future-proof these recommendations, to guarantee that this new, more sensible arrangement is not short-lived and that NCHIs do not spring back to life, Freddy Krueger-like, in a few years’ time, is to give the new regime some statutory underpinning. Proposed subsection (1) in this amendment drives a stake through the heart of NCHIs and makes sure they cannot be resurrected in the absence of primary legislation to the contrary. No Parliament can bind its successors. Indeed, if the Home Secretary wants to take up some, but not all, of the report’s recommendations, the Government could amend this amendment at Third Reading. In the meantime, I urge them to support these sensible suggestions and put them on a statutory footing.

In my view, too many of the rules governing how public authorities behave are found in guidance when they should properly be in statute. Indeed, the current NCHI regime, which I think we are all agreed is not fit for purpose, emerged from guidance issued by the College of Policing in 2014 and was not put on a statutory footing until 2022, by which time it was too late for Parliament to wrest control over it. A bureaucratic leviathan had been created in the form of ever more voluminous guidance. Let us not make the same mistake again. Something as important as what incidents reported to the police are investigated and recorded and, in some cases, disclosed in enhanced DBS checks is properly a matter for Parliament, which is why I urge your Lordships’ House to support this amendment.

[Lord Fuller (Con)]

My Lords, as the leader of the local authority, I had to address a public meeting in Wymondham in Norfolk at least 10 years ago, I cannot quite remember. It was about providing accommodation in the local plan for Gypsies and Travellers. I see here in the Chamber this evening at least four former council leaders, and I hope they will sympathise with the dilemma I faced. It is a thorny subject. Not many people have sympathy for Gypsy and Traveller families, but it is one of those hands you are dealt when you become a leader. The meeting was highly charged. I was in the lions’ den, but at least I was able to rely on a briefing from the council solicitor and monitoring officer as to what was the safe ground: the procedure about the local plan, the process about assessing needs, the duty to balance the needs of the settled and travelling communities and the obligations to follow the law. My job was to hold the ring.

I do not think I made any friends that evening, but I was the messenger for a law that not everybody appreciated. But, if the council did not follow the law, who else would? I got out alive and, in the circumstances, I think it probably went as well as it could have. The alternative was probably not to turn up, and that would not have been right at all. So imagine my surprise when I was called to a police interview a few days later to answer for a non-crime hate incident. I was supported by the council’s solicitor, who confirmed that, yes, I had accurately reported the process and the law at the meeting. Right was on my side. But that meant nothing. Perhaps someone in the audience that evening in Wymondham had hurty feelings. Perhaps they had an axe to grind against Gypsies and Travellers. Perhaps they were political opponents. Ironically, perhaps they were prejudiced against me.

23:30

I was invited to apologise to the unnamed and unidentified complainant, and I refused. It was explained that, in the absence of an apology, I would be reported to the prosecutor for a hate crime and would have to defend myself in court. The hate crime, it was explained, was not objective or grounded in the merits viewed through the filter of the law. No, it was solely to be assessed subjectively by the beholder. I was not going to be cowed, so I literally said, “No, go and prosecute me”. I dared them. I would welcome the opportunity to set the record straight. My council chief executive swallowed hard, but I never heard from them again, which shows what a nonsense the whole thing was.

So Amendment 387B, in the name of my noble friend Lord Young and others, shows what a resource-sapping, police-diverting bureaucracy there is around all this. We need the police to focus on real crimes, grounded in the law: something material. As a nation, we have strayed from the path. I recognise what is in the government amendment, but I think we have lost perspective and must wipe the slate clean, literally, for those who have been unjustly tainted by this.

I am not talking about grossly offensive, inflammatory provocations: they are crimes, they should be crimes and they will still be crimes. But this amendment puts an end to the nonsense for people such as council leaders, who are meant to be on your side and to enjoy freedom of expression but are cowed. So I hope that all sides of this House will stand shoulder to shoulder at this late hour with those council leaders who metaphorically put themselves in harm’s way. If we do not stand up for the unfashionably marginalised—people such as the Gypsies and Travellers who are looking for a home under the structure of a local plan, or public servants communicating a difficult message that may not be popular but is the right thing to do—who will? On that basis, I support Amendment 387B.

[Baroness Lawrence of Clarendon (Lab)]

My Lords, I did not intend to speak. I spoke in Committee, and I listened to what the Minister put forward and what the noble Lord on the opposite Bench said about the recording of non-crime hate. It depends on how you see non-crime hate and on who is at the receiving end of it. For me, it led to the murder of my son. For individuals who think they have the right to walk around and talk about especially young black men in a certain way, what starts off as just verbal leads to violence. This is what I tried put across in Committee: people see the verbal as a playground, but it is not necessarily that. After the inquiry, when that was put into a recommendation, it was said that, if those who are on the receiving end—or people around them—perceive it to be something, that is what it is.

If you take that away and do not record it, how do you move forward, if it then moves from something verbal into violence and you have no way of tracking back to where it started from? Okay, so within the report here, it could be said in a way so it comes across to make sure that you do not lose that part of it, because some of it leads to violence and that is what happened to my son. Hence, I take offence when people say that it is just playground talk, because it does not necessarily mean that. So noble Lords should please consider what they are saying here and what implications it has outside, and our children.

[Lord Young of Acton (Con)]

Perhaps I could briefly add something to what the noble Baroness has just said. Just to clarify, I think that the kinds of remarks that she is talking about that were made about her son would be recorded and would meet the new criteria under the anti-social behaviour incident regime, which, as I understand it, is going to replace the NCHI regime. They would remain on a police database in a way that could then be used to detect and prevent a crime: they would meet the new recording threshold. I have no objection to that kind of thing being recorded: I think that it would serve a useful policing purpose. So just to be clear, I am not in any way suggesting that those kinds of remarks should not be included in future—I think that they should be—but I want to exclude the more trivial things from being recorded and having the police waste so much time on them.

[Baroness Lawrence of Clarendon (Lab)]

But you would not know until it gets to that point: to violence. If you do not start off with where it starts from, you will never get to the end, whether that is from trivial chat or whatever you want to call it, or playground. Later on, if that same individual or whoever carries on, that leads to violence, and if you have no way of going back to check where that started from, how do you know to be able to prosecute that individual for what he said, going back further to where we are now? That is what we need to be very careful about.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, to follow on from the noble Baroness, Lady Lawrence of Clarendon, one difficulty that we have had in relation to any discussion such as this is that the police are under an enormous amount of pressure because of the horrible things that happen—understatement of the year—to imagine that all speech can lead to violence. If they see that, obviously they will police all speech and treat everybody’s speech as potentially dangerous and damaging. Once that happens, we no longer live in a free, democratic society. That is quite straightforward.

One thing that I think is very difficult is that the horror of Stephen’s racist murder and the fact that the police did not intervene and there was so much scandal around it means that sometimes people feel very nervous, anxious or worried about saying anything in the name of fighting hate, in case they are somehow implicated in having prejudiced views. I would like to enthusiastically welcome the Government’s Amendment 383, abolishing the statutory basis for non-crime hate incidents, because, over the past few years, when some of us have raised problems with non-crime hate incidents, and with the police policing those incidents—as in attitudes and words—it has felt as though we were banging our heads against a brick wall. So it feels quite good to count this as something of a win, and even to be vindicated, because, to be honest, opposing non-crime hate incidents has meant facing some brickbats, both outside here, in my capacity as the director of the Academy of Ideas, and, to be honest, especially in here. There was a less than subtle inference that opposition to non-crime hate incidents, or indeed a whole range of hate legislation in fact, revealed some lurking bigotry or was proof that we were soft on hate.

Yet here we are, and that is proof of something else that is important: that it is always worth raising issues here and battling on, because sometimes Governments can change their minds and sometimes the College of Policing can change its mind—you can make people look at things again. I also welcome the outbreak of common sense and reasonableness from the College of Policing and the fact that there has been a genuine attempt to get on top of what obviously was not intended from the original non-crime hate incidents—it has got completely out of hand. Despite that, and despite the fact that I am delighted that the notions of freedom of expression and free speech have now been taken seriously by the different bodies, I still have some worries and would like some reassurance and clarification from the Minister.

I am worried about the risk of non-crime hate incidents simply being rebranded. The Government have suggested, as we have heard, that some incidents currently recorded as NCHIs will continue to be recorded as anti-social behaviour incidents. Despite what the noble Lord, Lord Young, explained in terms of the higher threshold, I want to check with the Minister whether the behaviour that will be recorded that way will still be based on the subjective premise of a victim perceiving hostility or prejudice towards protected characteristics.

As so much anti-social behaviour regulation, as we discussed earlier on Report, is prosecuted to a lower evidential standard yet treated as a criminal offence and can lead to criminal sanctions, could this lower threshold be used in such incidents? I am worried about repeating the same problems. Can the Minister also rule out that any such anti-social behaviour hate incidents will be added to the national crime database, disclosed in enhanced DBS checks or investigated in much the same way as NCHIs? I am not sure about that.

One reason why I support Amendment 387B in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Young of Acton, is that it will make it harder to set up an alternative recording system that is NCHIs in all but name. I am also worried about ambiguity and confusion if we leave all this to guidance, as has been mentioned. As I understand it, police forces are not prohibited from continuing to record NCHIs under the Government’s amendment for quite a while, and I am just not sure how this is going to happen.

The statutory basis for NCHIs under Sections 60 and 61 of the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act was simply a way for the Secretary of State to issue guidance. Will repealing the statutory basis alone not simply mean that the police will return to the pre-2023 position where they continue with NCHIs under their own guidance? Maybe I have misunderstood that. Even if that happening only temporarily until the Government worked out exactly what to do, I am concerned about this muddled period.

Amendment 387B would rule out this concerning prospect, offer the police some clarity and guarantee the outcome that we all desire. Clarity, or lack of it, has always been a bugbear in relation to non-crime hate incidents. It is why I am so anxious to hear how the Government’s plans will be communicated, and I hope there will be clarity. On the one hand, we have experience of how a lack of clarity led to the growth of NCHIs without any intention for that to happen. Even the current DPP, Stephen Parkinson, admitted to the Times Crime and Justice Commission that until recently he “had no idea” what an NCHI was, was puzzled by it, and had to look up what on earth the term meant. That was the current DPP, noting that even within the police service there has been some surprise at the level of non-crime hate incidents that were being investigated because they did not know what they were.

The last thing police forces need now is to be left in limbo in any way, while consultation, regulations or guidance is sorted out. We know from An Inspection into Activism and Impartiality in Policing published by His Majesty’s inspectorate in September 2024 that there has been inconsistency in the way forces have responded to NCHI guidance. What happens if some of the more EDI-enthusiastic forces carry on spending thousands of hours sifting through online posts, seeking out so-called hate and so on and investigating common everyday interactions as if they are crimes, which I know is not what the Government or the College of Policing intend?

Limbo in law is never good and any ambiguities can lead to the law being flouted. I will give just one comparison. As of October 2025, the start of the academic year, only one university had complied with the Supreme Court judgment clarifying biological sex in relation to the Equality Act. The rest claimed to be waiting for the EHRC code—waiting for guidance rather than complying with their legal obligations. I do not want the same thing to happen.

23:45

I preferred the original Amendment 387. I understand why it has been changed, but I prefer the idea of mandating the deletion of all historic records of NCHIs within three months of Royal Assent. The government amendment does not directly address what will be done with existing records in relation to their ongoing impact on individuals’ job prospects. As we have cited the noble Lord, Lord Macdonald of River Glaven, so much, I will quote him here, where he says

“if you’re going to attach someone’s name to these incidents, then you better be sure that there’s a good reason for doing that … Because five years down the line, when they apply for a job, they might not get it. And that might be as a result of a … non-crime hate incident recorded against their name that was entirely baseless, entirely motivated by spite or misunderstanding or whatever”.

How can we make sure that these NCHIs, which could have been recorded against someone’s name based on discredited misplaced statutory guidance from the past, do not punish people now?

I was recently reminded of the noble Lord’s words when I met one of the teachers involved with four pupils in Wakefield who, if noble Lords remember, slightly damaged a Koran in 2023. The police recorded an NCHI against them. Despite the school admitting that there was no malicious intention and one of the pupils was autistic, Inspector Thornton told concerned parents at the local mosque that the damage was being treated as a hate incident. Those young boys are now getting to an age when they will be applying for jobs. Does the Minister agree that it would be a travesty if the records of their NCHIs on the police database were used to stop them getting a foot on the work ladder? I just want to make sure that we do not forget that different type of victim.

[Lord Herbert of South Downs (Con)]

My Lords, I draw attention to my entry in the register of interests showing that I am the chair of the College of Policing. We are broadly in agreement about the way forward. There is a large measure of agreement that the current system of non-crime hate incidents is no longer fit for purpose. As the Minister said, under the new proposals in the final report into this matter that the College of Policing and the National Police Chiefs’ Council have produced, which goes to the police chiefs’ council next week for ratification, non-crime hate incidents will no longer be recorded. They will go.

I assure the noble Baroness, Lady Fox, that this will not be a mere rebranding exercise. The threshold of an incident will be significantly increased. Common-sense professional judgment will guide decisions and only where there is a genuine risk of harm and a clear policing purpose will incidents continue to be recorded. The powerful intervention by the noble Baroness, Lady Lawrence of Clarendon, reminds us of the importance of ensuring that, where there is a risk of harm, we must continue to record the incidents. That was the original reason why, as a result of the recommendation of the Macpherson review, this regime was put in place. However, for all the reasons we have discussed, it does not work properly and there is a better approach that will reduce police time.

So far, so good, and I can therefore agree with most of my noble friend Lord Young’s Amendment 387. The one problematic area is the requirement that all records must be deleted after three months. The policy on deletion is a matter for the Government, not for the College of Police or the National Police Chiefs’ Council, but the view of those bodies is that it would be disproportionately burdensome to go back and delete all the existing records.

[Lord Young of Acton (Con)]

Just to be clear, one of the differences between the amendment as originally drafted and this new version is that the new version no longer asks the police to go through all their databases and delete all historic NCHIs. It just asks them to delete those they come across. So, if a person who thinks they have an NCHI recorded against them, like my noble friend, writes to the police, fires off an SAR and discovers they have an NCHI still recorded against their name—and it does not meet the new, higher recording threshold—the police will be obliged to delete it. The amendment does not ask the police to go through records. As my noble friend says, that would be too resource-intensive; all it asks is that, when they come across them, they delete them if they do not meet the new threshold.

[Lord Herbert of South Downs (Con)]

Okay; that is helpful. I thank my noble friend, and I am sure the Government will respond to that. But if part of the purpose of this is to ensure that it meets the concern my noble friend set out—that people may, to use his words, be prevented from getting a job because of the release of a non-crime hate incident in an enhanced DBS check—I should point out that the review has not been able to find a single example of a non-crime hate incident being disclosed in an extended DBS check and preventing someone from securing employment. We therefore think the risk of that is very low. The release is a matter for the chief constable’s discretion. Of course, the risk could be made even lower if the new, higher threshold were applied to any future decision, but again, that would be within the Government’s gift to agree. What is already a negligible risk could be made even more negligible, so that would address the concern.

The final question relates to whether non-crime hate incidents will spring back into life, to use my noble friend’s expression. My response is, not so long as I am involved with this, and I am sure I could say the same for the chief executive of the college, Sir Andy Marsh. The serious point, however, is that there clearly has been a change of mood, partly because of the way in which social media has influenced this whole matter. But such action is always within the gift of any future Government, as my noble friend conceded: no Government can bind themselves to changing practice and policy. What matters now is that we put in place a robust regime that works and ensure that the police are focused on the right things.

Therefore, I am very pleased we have this broad agreement about the way forward. I do not think my noble friend’s amendment is necessary, but it is for the Government to respond to that. We must be wary of tying up the police more on this, when we are trying to release their time. We must also be aware of the injunction of the noble Baroness, Lady Lawrence: that serious incidents must continue to be recorded. We must remember why this regime was set up in the first place. Not every recorded non-crime hate incident has been trivial; they can indicate a building pattern of behaviour and that is what we have to guard against. But the new system will put in place higher thresholds to ensure that the trivial are weeded out, and that, I think, is what we all want.

[Lord Strasburger (LD)]

My Lords, given the hour I do not want to detain the House for much longer. In fact, I have deleted the first page of my speech accordingly, and I will address the comments of the noble Baroness, Lady Lawrence, in a moment.

First, this amendment insists that all future incident recording guidance must have due regard to freedom of expression—and that matters. In a liberal democracy, the test is not whether we protect only speech we agree with; it is whether we protect the space for robust, sometimes uncomfortable, debate on race, religion, sex, gender, politics and many other issues.

Police guidance should start from the principle that lawful speech is not a policing problem. Further, it deals with the past as well as the future. It should require that historic non-crime hate incident records which do not meet the proper recording threshold must not be disclosed on DBS checks and must be deleted when discovered. That is vital for natural justice. If we accept that this category has been misused and overused, we cannot leave people’s lives quietly marred by data that should never have been held in the first place. I particularly address these remarks to the noble Baroness, Lady Lawrence.

This is not about turning a blind eye to genuine hate crime. On the contrary, by scrapping a vague, perception-based non-crime category, we free up police time and attention to focus on real offences: threats, harassment, violence and criminal damage. We will make the system clearer for victims and for officers. We will be sending a simple message that if you have been the victim of a crime, the law is there to protect you, and if you have merely heard something you strongly dislike, that is not in itself a matter for the police.

At the moment, too many people are unsure where that line lies. They fear that expressing a lawful view on a controversial subject might bring a knock at the door or a mark on their record. That chilling effect is corrosive. It drives honest disagreement underground and pushes some people out of the public square altogether. We should be defending the right to argue and criticise, and to challenge within the law, not encouraging people to outsource every disagreement to the police.

The amendment would preserve the ability of the police to record information where it is genuinely necessary for crime prevention and public safety. It would hardwire respect for freedom of expression into any future guidance. In doing so, it would strengthen civil liberties and good policing. It says that the police are there to deal with crime, not to catalogue lawful opinions. This is a distinction worth defending and I urge the House to support this amendment.

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords, I have listened carefully to the contributions from the Minister and the noble Lord, Lord Young, on their amendments, and to other speakers around your Lordships’ House. I want to return to the difficult and sensitive issues, raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Lawrence, of where the boundaries are and protecting the vulnerable versus free speech. We have debated that in some detail, with examples in Committee, so I will not rehearse those. I have two questions for the Minister about the new arrangements.

We are losing from the guidance a useful paragraph that sets out exactly that the risk of significant harm may be greater if the individual who has experienced the incident is considered to be vulnerable, and then directs people to the College of Policing as to how the police do that. I mention this to the noble Lord, Lord Young, who said that everything under the regime that is about to disappear was entirely in the view of the individual who felt that that they were being done. That has not been the case. It has been assessed by the police, following the code of practice.

Can the Minister reassure your Lordships’ House that, in deleting Sections 60 and 61 of the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act, the police will not lose the balance that we have in the current code that sets out how to determine a vulnerable person from one of the categories covered in the Act, including race, religion, disability and LGBT, and the real risk that a crime may be committed in the future?

The noble Baroness, Lady Lawrence, spoke very eloquently. What she did not say, and everyone has assumed, is that it was absolutely obvious from the start, when the verbal attacks started on Stephen and other young people in his area, that it would not have looked like something that should have been recorded. But there is something called a course of conduct, which is very common in harassment and stalking and a number of anti-social behaviours that start to build up, and the police bring in psychologists to look at that behaviour. One of the problems is that we cannot lose that progression. If things stop being recorded, I do not understand how you can do it. There are certainly rules about not using it in DBS checks, but if you lose that information, I really fear that the noble Baroness, Lady Lawrence, is right to have concerns. So, can I ask the Minister if the Government—

[Lord Young of Acton (Con)]

The disagreement is not about whether incidents should be recorded because they could form part of a course of conduct which ends in a serious crime. The argument is about where the recording threshold should be placed. Surely the noble Baroness will accept that, if it is so low that the police are recording 65 non-crime hate incidents every day in England and Wales alone, then the threshold is too low.

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

The hour is late and I really do not want to get into a debate about that. The point is that the police are going to have to make whatever the new system is work. My worry is that there seems to be a line now that might exclude cases that are important because of the course of conduct which might become a criminal act.

I did not manage to get quite to the end of my speech. I therefore ask the Minister whether the Government are confident that such a course of conduct under a number of non-crime hate incidents would be visible to the police if the code of practice is repealed and the police stop recording them.

[Lord Lebedev (CB)]

My Lords, I will not take much of your time. First, I fully respect and acknowledge the arguments made by the noble Baroness, Lady Lawrence, which I feel have been addressed very well from the other side of the House. I support Amendment 387B and endorse the arguments made by noble Lords, including the noble Lord, Lord Young of Acton, in favour of this amendment.

Last July, I was able to raise the widespread concerns so many of us have about non-crime hate incidents—NCHIs—in a short debate in this House. I was encouraged by the widespread support across parties for a robust stance in defence of free speech. Many noble Lords outlined how pernicious NCHIs are. I was grateful to the Minister for his thoughtful engagement on the arguments.

Since that debate, there has been a welcome retreat from the use of NCHIs, with the Metropolitan Police Commissioner and others recognising the inappropriateness of using valuable police time to harass individuals for exercising their right to free speech. Like the noble Lord, Lord Young, I am pleased that police leaders and Ministers now recognise that recording the names of citizens on police databases for actions which are not crimes should be curtailed. That is customary good practice, but it is, in this case, not enough.

We need to ensure that there is appropriate statutory protection for free speech, and we need to ensure that past expressions of opinion, which may have been recorded under a previous regime, cannot be used to blight the future of citizens. Amendment 387B would not only wipe clean the slate but affirm the importance of free speech, the foundational freedom on which all others depend. I commend it to the House.

[Lord Davies of Gower (Con)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow so many excellent speeches from noble Lords across the House who recognise the problems that non-crime hate incidents have caused. I am very pleased to see that there is much agreement on this matter, and I am particularly grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Herbert of South Downs, for his update, as it were. I am also particularly grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Lawrence, for her very important intervention.

Like many of my noble friends and many noble Lords around the House, I fully support Amendment 387B tabled by my noble friend Lord Young of Acton and the noble Lords, Lord Strasburger and Lord Hogan-Howe. The amendment would bring about the abolition of the category of so-called non-crime hate incidents. If this were to become the law of the land, NCHIs would be permanently dead. Their recording and retention would end, and we could finally put this well-intentioned but ultimately damaging experiment to bed.

We have had many debates during the passage of the Bill about the various tenets of hate crime laws and aggravating factors based on hostility. Indeed, only last Wednesday, the Government were successful in expanding their enormous web of legislation even further, despite our best efforts to stop them. We have lost that battle for now, but I reiterate my opposition to those provisions. While related to the debate we had last Wednesday, the matter before us now is rather different. Non-crime hate incidents are not hate crimes; they are something quite different. They represent the recording by police of incidents that are not crimes at all.

The House will have heard the background to NCHIs from other noble Lords, so I will not repeat that, but their establishment in 2014 via guidance issued by the College of Policing was motivated by sincere intentions. They were supposed to assist police in identifying patterns of hostility in communities that might escalate into criminal behaviour, and that objective was understandable, but in practice, the policy has drifted far beyond that limited purpose. We now find ourselves in a position where individuals can have a police record created about them for conduct that is entirely lawful, simply because another person perceives it to have been motivated by hostility. That is a very serious matter indeed.

The threshold for the recording of these incidents is ridiculously low. A person needs only to be concerned by another’s conduct in order for them to report such conduct to the police for recording as an NCHI.

The matter has quite rightly received serious scrutiny in recent years, and I particularly want to reference the independent review conducted by the College of Policing and led by my noble friend Lord Herbert of South Downs into the use of non-crime hate incidents. The review acknowledged a number of very significant concerns, and it recognised that the recording of such incidents had in some cases created a chilling effect on free expression. It also identified problems with the threshold for recording and the potential for disproportionate interference in the lives of individuals who had committed no crime.

The review led to revised guidance from the College of Policing intended to raise the threshold for recording NCHIs and better protect freedom of expression. I welcome that effort. It was a step in the right direction.

The review also demonstrated something more fundamental—that the concept itself is deeply problematic. We have seen, over the years, a number of examples where the recording of non-crime hate incidents has been plainly vexatious, trivial or disproportionate. In one widely reported case, a former police officer found himself the subject of a non-crime hate incident after engaging in a debate on social media about gender identity. There are several examples that have been given in the debate, so I shall not provide further evidence. There have been cases where individuals have had police records created simply for sharing satirical material online, expressing controversial opinions or engaging in perfectly lawful political debate. We should pause and consider what this means in practice.

In some circumstances, such records may be disclosed during enhanced background checks conducted by the Disclosure and Barring Service. That means that an allegation about a non-criminal matter could potentially affect a person’s employment prospects, particularly in professions involving children or vulnerable adults. There have been documented cases where individuals have feared precisely that outcome.

I also recall the remarks of Ministers during our Committee debates, in which the Government acknowledged the importance of protecting free speech in this area, and the Home Office has repeatedly recognised the need to strike the right balance. Indeed, the Home Secretary herself has spoken publicly about the importance of ensuring that policing does not stray into the regulation of lawful expression. She has emphasised that police officers must focus on real crime and genuine threats to public safety. I agree with those sentiments, but I suggest that the time has come to move beyond incremental reform. The fundamental difficulty is that the concept of a non-crime hate incident places the police in the position of adjudicating perceived hostility in circumstances where no law has been broken. That is an uncomfortable and inappropriate role for the police service.

I put on record my thanks to the Minister for making the time to meet us and to the College of Policing for the briefing it gave on its plans for the future recording of such incidents. It was helpful of the Minister to set out some of that when we opened.

As my noble friend Lord Young of Acton said, the proposals by the college are certainly welcome. It has been clear that NCHIs will not exist any more and that any incident where hostility is a motivating factor will now be recorded as an ASB incident. Critically, these will not be disclosed in enhanced DBS checks. The college has also said that it will be providing updated guidance and training to clarify the higher standards of proof required for the recording of such incidents, and a new triaging method.

This is all welcome, but that does not mean that all is perfect. I still have some concerns and will briefly outline them. My first concern is that, if the abolition of NCHIs is not embedded in statute, there is the possibility of them being brought back to life in the future. All it would take is a change in Home Secretary, or a new Prime Minister, who could reintroduce them by the back door. If all we have is guidance, there is no legal safeguard to prevent them returning. I would feel much more comfortable knowing that they are gone for good and will never be resurrected from the dead.

Secondly, it must be explicitly acknowledged that any guidance produced by the College of Policing about the future recording of incidents will have freedom of expression at its heart. If this had been the case when the NCHI regime was created, we might not have seen as many unintended consequences. It is a fairly basic requirement, which is why I am pleased that my noble friend has included that in his amendment.

Thirdly, the issue of historic NCHI recordings needs to be addressed. Given that the Government have now agreed to abolish them, it does not seem right that thousands will still exist and may very well be disclosed in enhanced DBS checks. That is a matter of fairness. Individuals should not carry the burden of a police record relating to conduct that was never a crime in the first place. That has now been acknowledged as a mistake.

However, like my noble friend, I appreciate the point made by the College of Policing: that to require their deletion within a few months, as the original amendment sought, would be a highly labour-intensive process. If our purpose is to prevent the police wasting time and allow them to do their job, requiring them to sit down and trawl through every single file does not make sense. However, where NCHI recordings are discovered, they should be deleted and they most certainly should not be disclosed. It is sensible to have the guarantee in statute.

The college and the Government have made commendable progress and I reiterate that I am genuinely pleased at the direction of travel. However, we still need some guardrails. That is why we on these Benches believe that there must be a provision in legislation to ensure that NCHIs are gone, that they do not return and that the new regime is more transparent, reasonable and respectful of freedom of expression. For that reason, I very much support Amendment 378B and, if my noble friend does press it to a Division, we will follow him into the Content Lobby.

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

I am grateful for the discussion and, in winding up this debate, I put on record my thanks to Sir Andy Marsh of the College of Policing for the work he has done on this exercise of examining non-crime hate incidents. I remind the House that we are here today with the amendments I have tabled and with the outline that I have given from the College of Policing response, which the chair of the College of Policing has also endorsed. We are here today because the then Home Secretary, my right honourable friend Yvette Cooper, commissioned that review and asked for a report to be produced. That is why we are here today: we have taken action.

I listened with great interest to the noble Lord, Lord Fuller, talking about his experiences. That was not the responsibility of this Government. We are trying to change that regime. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Young of Acton, that we are trying to change that regime. I say to all noble Lords who spoke that we are trying to change that regime. However, I say to my noble friend Lady Lawrence of Clarendon that, in doing so, we want to ensure that we keep the essence of what that regime was established for: to identify precisely the issues that she mentioned in her very powerful contribution. The intent—to gather information, to prevent crime, to understand tensions, to look at potential areas where tensions could arise, to support investigations and to safeguard the vulnerable—remains as relevant today as it did 30 years ago.

I say to the noble Lords, Lord Lebedev, Lord Fuller, Lord Young of Acton, and the noble Baroness, Lady Fox of Buckley, who have spoken on this issue, that we understand the issue. However, I hope that we are making some movement to address the concerns, at the same time as keeping the essence of why those non-crime hate incidents needed to be recorded in the first place, and to have the revisions that the College of Policing have brought forward. Once they are endorsed, we will look at how we put those into practice in due course. I hope that will help both the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, and the noble Lord, Lord Strasburger.

00:15

The main issue that the noble Lord, Lord Young of Acton, has referred to is the prohibition of the disclosure of any historic records in enhanced disclosure and barring services that do not meet the new incident recording threshold and to require that such records be deleted. I note that the noble Lord has changed the deletion measure, because I think he recognises, having had the briefing that we arranged, that there is a big administrative burden in that deletion. I can tell him that non-crime hate incidents do not appear currently on a basic or standard DBS check. The Home Office is not aware of any evidence to suggest that there is a problem in practice with the disclosure of non-crime hate incidents on enhanced criminal record checks. Enhanced DBS checks are used only for sensitive roles involving work with children or adults.

I hope it will help the House if I say that the figures bear this out. It is extremely rare for any non-conviction or caution to be disclosed. In the figures for DBS checks issued in 2024-2025, of the 4.1 million enhanced certificates, only 0.12% contained disclosure of police information of any kind. Almost all of that was not in the areas that we have talked about this evening, so the figures are extremely small in the first place. However, to go back to the point mentioned by my noble friend Lady Lawrence, it is relevant and important that we should be looking at where there are areas where that could escalate. That is the essence of this, and it is important that we do not lose that in our discussions today.

It is ultimately for chief officers to determine whether the non-conviction information should be disclosed, in line with statutory guidance issued by the Home Office, reflecting the sensitive nature of the information. I do not believe it is appropriate for us to tie officers’ hands and apply a prohibition on disclosing information which may be relevant about individuals who choose to work with the most vulnerable in our society.

The figure for those 4.1 million enhanced DBS checks is just 0.12%—for the record, that is 4,920 disclosures out of 4.1 million—and of that small number not all were NCHIs; some were serious offences. It is a relatively small proportion. The noble Lord’s amendment, as well as originally being administratively difficult, would, in essence, tie officers’ hands in what is a very small percentage of work to be done.

[Lord Young of Acton (Con)]

I thank the Minister for giving way. I am struggling to understand what the rationale would be for disclosing in an enhanced DBS check an NCHI which, under the new recording thresholds, would not have been recorded. The Minister elided the issue by suggesting that the police—a chief constable—might think in future it would be sensible to disclose relevant information if someone is applying to work with children or vulnerable adults. But if the police would not have recorded that historic NCHI under the new higher recording threshold—because it would not be considered to have any police or intelligence value, or value in the detection or prevention of a crime—what justification could there be for disclosing it in an enhanced DBS check? If there is not one, what will it cost the Government to put it in statute that it cannot happen?

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

The noble Lord is asking for the deletion of historic records. That is the important point I am trying to make. If the chief officer determines that that non-conviction information should be disclosed—I go back to the 4,920 disclosures out of 4.1 million, including all matters for an enhanced DBS check—then it is important that we do not fetter the chief officer’s hands and apply a prohibition to disclose information which may be relevant to individuals. That may be a difference between us and, as the noble Lord, Lord David of Gower, said, we may well test that in a Division when the time comes.

The noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, made the absolutely right point that we need to ensure that we do not repeal Sections 60 and 61 until a replacement framework is in place. We will try to do that. As I said at the start of the debate and in the comments I have just made, it is essential that police and others continue to have the ability to monitor hate and hostility to prevent crime and safeguard the vulnerable. That is also the assurance I give to my noble friend Lady Lawrence.

In summary, the Government’s amendment is designed to repeal the statutory guidance, restore focus and reduce administrative burdens. We have made those changes because of the type of incidents noble Lords referred to. Amendment 387B would risk creating precisely the opposite effect and, for those reasons, the Government cannot support it. I invite the noble Lord not to move his amendment when the time comes, but, in the meantime—tonight—I commend Amendment 383 because, having considered and reviewed the matter, it is the right thing to do. In establishing the new regime, we will make sure that we keep the essence of the important matters from the former regime.

Amendment 383 agreed.

Consideration on Report adjourned.

House adjourned at 12.20 am.