EU: Asylum Seekers

Lord Desai Excerpts

Thursday 18th June 2015 Grand Committee

[Lord Desai (Lab)]

My Lords, let me move on from what people have said. I do not think that it matters very much whether we call them refugees, asylum seekers, or whatever. A lot of people want to migrate from where they are to where the economic prosperity is. That is not just a problem of Europe, where people are coming across from Africa or the Middle East; it is a global problem. There is the Rohingya problem; they are leaving Myanmar and ending up in Indonesia and Malaysia without any guarantee that they will be settled. If this is a global problem, it needs a global solution. It has to be tackled by the UN Security Council and the G20, because this flow of migrants will not cease. Even if we now share them equally and fairly, there will be the next share of a next wave of migrants because the world is very unstable, in both Africa and the Middle East, and people want to better their lives. They want to go where the prosperity is. The European Union should use its powers, especially the UK and France as Security Council members, to ask the United Nations to help us reach a global solution. There are countries that are sparsely populated—for example, Mongolia has only 2 million people. It could take 8 million and go up to 10 million. We should give them an economic incentive to accept refugees, because they are relatively less crowded countries. We have the problem that many people want to come here. It is a global and long-term problem that needs a global and long-term solution. The way we should do it is to make arrangements for people to be safely moved to countries that have agreed to accept them, and the countries that have agreed to accept them will get suitable aid. We can work on the short-term problems of adjustment, because these people are going to cost us a lot of money anyway, so we may as well transfer that money to Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan, Outer Mongolia and Mongolia and so on. We can look at the map of horrendously sparsely populated regions. Even Australia has only about 20 million people—less than Mumbai—so you can imagine how sparsely populated Australia is. I know that Australia makes a lot of trouble about this issue. But we need to sit down and think of solutions in which the entire world takes part in solving this problem. It is not just a European problem, although it happens to be European because Europe is nearer to North Africa. But that is no reason why Europe should bear the burden of all these problems. I suggest that the Minister goes off and proposes this scheme, and maybe the Prime Minister can take a lead and we can get a global solution.

Crime: Women's Safety

Lord Desai Excerpts

Tuesday 12th February 2013 Lords Chamber

Asked By

[Lord Desai]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government, in the light of the publication on 10 January by the Ministry of Justice, the Home Office and the Office for National Statistics of An Overview of Sexual Offending in England and Wales, what steps they are taking to protect women’s safety in the United Kingdom.

[Lord Desai]

My Lords, it is my pleasure to introduce an important theme in our series of Questions for Short Debate. I am very grateful to all noble Lords who have put down their names to speak. Peers from all sides have joined; and not too many, so we all have enough time to discuss this issue.

I was in Delhi when the horrible gang-rape incident happened on 16 December. I observed the amazing upsurge of movement among men and women in India, which later spread to other parts of the world, about the very urgent question of women’s safety as they go about the ordinary business of life—both inside and outside their homes. That is very important. This is not just a local Indian problem but a world-wide one. When I got back, I saw that the Government had issued an excellent document. The Ministry of Justice, the Home Office and the ONS had published a statistical bulletin, An Overview of Sexual Offending in England and Wales, which I want to use as a background to introduce the question of women’s safety.

First, although it is a very good document—it lays out the complexity of the issues, the different statistics, and the different sources and definitions with which we have to deal in judging the extent and seriousness of crime against women—parts of the problem are not covered in it. It relates mainly to adult women, aged 16 to 59, and therefore avoids the important question of children. There have been scandals in Rochdale, Derby and Torbay relating to the grooming of young girls and their exploitation. Perhaps other noble Lords will take up that issue. There is also the question of the abuse of elderly women. There are many other facets of the problem, which I hope other noble Lords will bring out.

The way the document lays out the issues emphasises one thing. According to the Crime Survey for England and Wales, only 15% of the victims of adverse sexual events actually report the case to the police. What we have in the statistics of police action on complaints is a very small part of the total problem. We ought to give some thought to how we can increase the rate of complaints and encourage women not to withdraw into a shell if they have had a horrible sexual experience and how we can encourage them to come out and complain.

A major difficulty with rape and other sexual assaults is that 85% to 90% of the perpetrators of the crime are known to the victim. They are partners, somebody in the family or somebody the victim knows very well. Part of the reluctance to complain may be that you might be harming a family member or friend. We ought to set up ways, perhaps after asking experts, to make the extent of the problem more visible to the police and the criminal justice system than it is at present. If we do that, we may be able to find out even more than before.

One rather tragic example is that of Frances Andrade, who was abused when she was a student at a music school. The case came to light many years later and she tragically died while the court case was going on. That shows us that women undergo a huge amount of bad experiences but somehow or other they are reluctant to, forbidden from or cajoled against complaining. We ought to deal with that as a first step.

If you bring together rape, sexual threats and indecent exposure, one woman in five experiences something sexually unpleasant. That is a very large number. It seems to be that practically every woman has an unpleasant experience in their life and somehow we do not find ways of getting around it. Half a million adult women are victims of sexual offences. Typically, according to the survey, the women who are more vulnerable to such attacks are young—16 to 19 years-old—are single or separated, have a low income, are sometimes students and are often physically unwell or disabled, as well as economically inactive. We have a profile of a vulnerable person who is more likely to be predated upon, and when we devise our systems for encouraging them to complain, following through what has happened to them and getting justice for them, we ought to look at this profile very carefully and find out how, based on that profile, we can add better things to protect these women’s lives than we have otherwise done.

I have very little complaint about the way the police operate and the courts go through with a complaint after it has been made. Perhaps other noble Lords will know more about that. There is of course a problem of delay. It seems that it takes more than a year from the beginning, when the police register the complaint, to the end of the process. It may be that this is inevitable—you must not hurry a process in such a way that may make injustice more likely, and we want to be scrupulously fair both to the victim and the offender and not prejudge the issue. Have the Government thought about any means for speeding up this process, while preserving the scrupulous care with which we administer justice? The victims would have some guarantee that there would be a somewhat speedier resolution to their problem than at present.

I do not want to take up all my 10 minutes, because I think other noble Lords will want to say more. I am looking forward to hearing the Minister say what the Government are doing to tackle this problem.

Protection of Freedoms Bill

Lord Desai Excerpts

Tuesday 31st January 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hughes of Woodside]

My Lords, I rise to support my noble friend Lord Campbell-Savours, who has put the case for his amendment with eloquence and his usual attention to detail, which we should not simply shrug aside.

There is a great feeling these days that we are moving towards some sort of society that is totally controlled by the powers that be, known or unknown. People frequently call into aid the infamous—or famous, if you like—book 1984, in which Big Brother was always watching you. Of course we do not want to move down into that kind of society, and although I support the idea of a national DNA database, as I said earlier, if we cannot get one by normal means then by all means let us get it by voluntary means.

Perhaps I might correct an impression that I gave. I seem to have misled the noble Lord, Lord Henley. In an earlier debate, I spoke about the length of time for which DNA evidence might lie about unidentified. I am not suggesting for one second that such evidence would be destroyed as a result of this Bill. I am perfectly aware that it would not be. The point I was trying to make is that there is an ever increasing gap between the time when unidentified DNA evidence comes to the notice of the police and the authorities and the time when it is identified. Thus the gap between the availability of the evidence and its identification and the identification on the database is growing wider and wider.

One noble Lord said that there was an argument for keeping DNA for ever on a database. I accept that. I am not the least bit frightened about DNA material being kept if it is in the public good. It is a question of balance. The Government have decided what the balance is, and some of us might disagree, but I think there is common ground between us on the point that the objective of the exercise of collecting DNA evidence is to prosecute and to convict the guilty, and where possible to protect the innocent, who might be attacked by someone who has not been charged previously but who then can be.

I will not labour the argument except to say that a voluntary database is a very good idea. I wonder whether my noble friend might agree that we should have some sort of pilot system to try to persuade people that everyone should be on it. Perhaps we should proceed by trying to persuade people that such a thing is a good idea and to volunteer for a limited period to see what the take-up is.

With these few words, I certainly support my noble friend’s amendment, and I hope that the House will support it.

[Lord Desai]

My Lords, I apologise for not having spoken before in a debate on this Bill. I have listened to the excellent idea of my noble friend Lord Campbell-Savours about a voluntary DNA database, but I want to say just one thing. Yes, a voluntary database is a good idea, but if people do not volunteer they should not be marked down as being unco-operative. It is quite likely that some people will not like the idea of offering their DNA. It would be a very bad thing if it got to the stage where not volunteering became a black mark against you. It would detract from the virtue of my noble friend’s suggestion. Certain ethnic communities, especially women, may not want to have their DNA taken. Therefore, we must make sure that it is not held against them if they do not volunteer.

[The Earl of Erroll]

My Lords, I was quite attracted by the concept of the freedom to choose voluntarily to do something but in this case it leads us astray. History teaches us that, if there is a large amount of private information out there which a Government think is useful, they will acquire access to it. For example, the USA Patriot Act gives the American Government access to anything they want in the name of trying to fight terrorism. Therefore, these data will not necessarily be secure in perpetuity if someone sees a use for them.

I have also learnt from history that governments who accumulate a large amount of information on their citizens end up using it to control the everyday lives of those citizens. For starters, you only have to look at communist Russia, watch “Dr Zhivago”, or look at East Germany, Albania or all sorts of places, where, at the end of the day, these things are used to control behaviours. I am sorry but I do not trust the people who end up in charge of these things. We need to look 10, 20 or 30 years ahead and we do not know who will be in control then.

Perversely, as a result, it does not necessarily protect citizens. It is not as if this will give an automatic one-to-one match. It would do what this Bill is trying to prevent. The Bill is trying to protect us from the Government trying to accumulate large amounts of data. DNA of course is not infallible. Ultimately, it is vulnerable to contamination of samples and laboratory error. It is only an approximate match; it is not a one-to-one match the whole time. Therefore, there will be errors which could be misused. I think that this amendment concerns a bigger subject and should be left out of the Bill. It does not fit with it.

Terrorism Prevention and Investigation Measures Bill

Lord Desai Excerpts

Wednesday 5th October 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Desai]

My Lords, as the previous two speakers have mentioned the cat, I, too, shall start with that. The cat in question was called Maya, which in Sanskrit means “illusion”. I think that the Home Secretary was under some illusion if she thought that her example of a cat would get her any sympathy for trying to mess about with the ECHR. It is quite right that this Bill is before us, because the ECHR is a problem with which we have to deal and we cannot suddenly invent things which defy it. It is because control orders have been questioned again and again in courts of law that we now have the TPIM.

I am a veteran of the battles of 2005. I slept in the Salisbury Room and was here for all 36 hours of the debate. From what I remember of that time, the problem that we faced, as noble Lords have pointed out, was not only that of discrimination between British citizens and foreigners but the fact that by the time a suicide bomber has committed his crime you cannot prosecute the criminal because he is dead. The question was: can you do something about someone who is planning, but has not committed, an act of terror? I am not a lawyer, so that is the question that I asked. I thought that we had to devise a way of doing something about someone who might be planning an act of terror or who might have a powerful association with such an act. The case for criminal prosecution was too weak but it was recognised that it was urgent that the person be prevented from going any further with his or her plans. That, I believe, was the nub of the problem. As the noble Lord, Lord Macdonald, said, ideally a suspect should be prosecuted under criminal procedures and we should see which way the court goes, but the problem is that the evidence against that person is not solid enough to secure a criminal prosecution. However, if you let him be, there is a possibility that a terrorist act will occur, by which time it will be too late to prosecute him. That is what I see as the dilemma.

In statistics, we have two types of error. One is that you may have a true hypothesis which you may reject by mistake because of the evidence that you have; the other is that you may end up accepting a false hypothesis. You cannot minimise both those possibilities. You can control one possibility and minimise the other. I believe that that is the same problem that we have here. How do you make sure that anyone who is likely to commit a terrorist act does not escape the possibility of being prevented from committing that act, while trying to ensure that someone who is perfectly innocent is not held in his house for 24 hours or whatever? Basically it is a security versus liberty dilemma. I do not believe, as the noble Lord, Lord Howard, said, that there is a definitive answer to this problem but I have always thought that control orders, and now TPIMs, are inadequate for dealing with it. There is absolutely no doubt that they offend against the pure principles of the rule of law, and all these years we have been trying to find something that is near enough to a compromise in dealing with this problem.

I can see that one or two concessions are being made in the Bill. We are going from “suspicion” to “belief”. That is a concession and it gets slightly closer to the norms of the rule of law. Perhaps we should go for the balance of probabilities—there might not be too much harm in that. At the same time, the trade-off seems to be that you not only go from suspicion to belief but you more or less retain control orders but give up the relocation right. I wonder whether there is a better trade-off than that. You keep all the details of control orders, including relocation, but you go from “belief” to “balance of probabilities”. Therefore, you are tougher in deciding to give a suspect a TPIM but you treat him in the same way as you would have treated him under a control order. Either way, the measure will be tested in courts of law and will then have to be modified. As my noble friend Lord Hunt and others have said, the relocation element gave the security services an effective weapon in controlling a likely terrorist. Therefore, perhaps we should retain that and make the test for the Home Secretary much tougher than “belief” by making it “balance of probabilities”. I would understand that trade-off.

I want to say one more thing about the effectiveness of this measure. The noble Lord, Lord Macdonald, who knows much more about this than I do, said that any such procedure is tested by prosecuting the likely terrorist. I think that there is another test of effectiveness but it is very hard to substantiate. By imposing either a control order or a TPIM, the act which the likely terrorist could have committed does not happen, and therefore the effectiveness of the control order or TPIM is very hard to prove. A lot of counterterrorism work is often effective not because it finds terrorists but because it prevents the occurrence of things which could have happened. Therefore, I think that there is an alternative route for measuring effectiveness in this case. This is not a crime like any other; it is a crime which, were it committed, could have serious consequences. We have to try to prevent someone committing a crime which could have serious consequences but, if he has not yet committed it, it might be very difficult to prosecute him. Therefore, there are all those problems.

The Government should make up their mind whether they want to be tough about the effectiveness of TPIMs or control orders. However, they should also be quite demanding about the proof that a Home Secretary has to give in order to make TPIMs admissible, and that is where the idea of balance of probabilities comes in. I think that that would strike a better balance in relation to effectiveness than has been the case so far.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Henley]

I will make no guarantee at this stage. I noted that my noble friend Lord Carlile suggested a delay for the Olympics. We will certainly look at that. It is something that I am sure will be argued in Committee. I give no guarantees but it is something that can be looked at. Obviously, it is important to get these things right.

[Lord Desai]

I was in India when the London riots took place. The one fear that everybody expressed was, “What will happen at the Olympics?”. It is very important that, whatever the Government do, they take care over the global anxiety about security in London during the Olympics, and do nothing to give the impression that we are lowering our guard.

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, I can give an assurance to the House, to the noble Lord and to anyone else who reads our debates that the Government take security for the Olympics very seriously indeed. Again, this is a point that we will have to consider further when we get to Committee stage but I note what the noble Lord had to say.

The noble Lords, Lord Goodhart and Lord Pannick, asked whether the TPIMs system should not be made by a judge rather than just judge reviewed. The noble Lord recalled the passage of the 2005 Act, which we all remember. He recalled my late noble friend Lord Kingsland, who at that stage wanted control orders to be made by the judge. I think that I was probably sitting next to him as he made those arguments but I cannot remember the exact outcome other than the fact that the Government got their way in the end and we have all moved on and changed our views on these things. However, we believe that this is a matter of national security and is properly a matter for the Secretary of State. While there obviously should be the appropriate extensive judicial oversight of the Secretary of State’s decision, it should none the less be the responsibility of the Home Secretary and not the High Court to impose these notices. We believe this is consistent with the approach that we have taken in other areas such as in decisions to exclude, deport or deprive citizenship on the basis of national security considerations. However, the TPIMs regime must certainly be subject to very thorough oversight arrangements by the courts. I hope that we have set out just how thorough those will be. As I said, we will continue to argue that case during the passage of the Bill.

As regards the renewal and the review by Parliament, as all noble Lords have reminded us, control orders have been subject to review every year. It was proposed that they should be reviewed every five years. That concession was brought in in another place. We believe that five years strikes the right balance. It will recognise the competence of Parliament—each Parliament will be five years from now on—to scrutinise the Bill and to arrive at a settled position on proportionate and effective powers that are needed to protect the public. It will also allow each new Parliament to review the situation and to consider whether the powers are still needed, and will mirror the length of Parliaments that we now have provided for in the Fixed-term Parliaments Bill. Ending annual renewal will allow the system to operate in a stable and considered way, focusing on protecting the public and striking the right balance with liberty rather than on merely political bickering. If we have the annual debate, I wonder whether, as with some other annual debates that we have, there will be a gradual diminishing in the interest taken in that and whether this is not something that should be left for each new Parliament to decide in due course. As I said, this matter has been raised by a large number of noble Lords on all sides of the House and I am more than happy to consider it again when we get to Committee stage.

My noble friend Lord Howard talked about being a member of the committee of privy counsellors looking at intercept and how he would have liked to use intercept if it were possible but that he was beginning to see the difficulties in so doing. I looked back to the debates in 2005 that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd, will remember. In those debates it was not Lord Kingsland arguing the point from the opposition Benches but myself. The noble and learned Lord will remember that we had considerable discussions on this matter. I think we all accept that views can change. We are committed to seeking a practical way that will allow the use of intercept evidence in court. That work is under way. My noble friend Lord Howard and others are involved in that. We will report to Parliament in due course. However, as my noble friend made perfectly clear, the issues are difficult and complex. None the less, we believe that a workable scheme could offer clear benefits in terms of enhanced scope to bring the guilty to justice and increased confidence in the justice system.

I wanted to cover those brief points at this stage. I appreciate that noble Lords have raised a large number of other points. I repeat that this has been a very good and useful debate in first airing our views on the Bill. That is exactly what a Second Reading should be. I look forward very much to Committee stage. I hope that we can continue to argue the case in a civilised manner and send the Bill back to another place in as good a state as we can get it. I commend the Bill to the House. I beg to move.

Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill

Lord Desai Excerpts

Thursday 14th July 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Morgan]

My Lords, I will speak briefly. I certainly support the amendment. It is extremely clear, giving a clear chain of command to deal with these matters.

My complaint is not that these demonstrations are visually offensive. People who demonstrate against the established order are not likely to be immaculate in their appearance or even, with all respect, in their conception. My problem is that these demonstrations offend the right to demonstrate. It is a very precious venue for demonstrations to occur. The imperishable rights of free speech, for which people have given their lives over the centuries in this country, should be preserved. The problem is that these demonstrations take root. They took root in the most obvious, physical way by people sleeping there. That not merely causes offence, which I understand, but obstructs and cheapens the right to demonstrate.

I am all in favour of large numbers of demonstrations taking place in Parliament Square. There are lots of things in our country to demonstrate about and lots of evils to complain about. We should cherish the right to protest but I am against monopoly. This is a self-centred, self-indulgent form of monopoly that is harmful to the rights of free speech. For that reason particularly, I support the excellent amendment.

[Lord Desai]

My Lords, I have spoken every time that Parliament Square has come up in your Lordships’ House. I rise once again, as sort of the sole defender of the unlimited right of people to demonstrate, despite all the ugliness that they might display. What I like about the proposed new clause in the noble Lord’s Amendment 306B is subsection (1), which asserts that the committee will,

“facilitate lawful, authorised demonstrations in the controlled area of Parliament Square”.

As I have said before in your Lordships’ House, one reason why people stay overnight is that they are not quite sure that they will be allowed to come the next morning to demonstrate. Once a committee has been established and lays down the rules under which people can lawfully demonstrate—that is, between 6 am and midnight—that situation will be clarified. Then the rest of Amendment 306B will ensure what everyone else wants—tidiness in Parliament Square. I have never been a great fan of tidiness. I have seen far too many tidy parliamentary squares in various eastern European and other regimes. I much prefer untidiness. It is characteristic of democracy.

[Lord Cormack]

The noble Lord has tidied himself in a way that has impressed every Member of this House.

[Lord Desai]

You must be generous and forgive mistakes now and then.

[Baroness Hamwee]

My Lords, I hope that what I am about to say does not damage the reputation of the noble Lord, Lord Desai. I, too, have argued throughout for the repeal of the SOCPA provisions and for not putting anything else in their place. I have said several times that aesthetic considerations—in other words, tidying up the square—should not be given more weight than considerations based on democracy.

I have a question for the noble Lord, Lord Marlesford, in his response to the debate. His amendments call for a committee consisting of representatives of the various bodies. The Metropolitan Police force is mentioned and clearly Westminster City Council and the Greater London Authority would be other candidates. I do not know if there are any more. In putting these amendments forward, what response has he had from those organisations—I assume he has consulted them at some stage during all of this—to the proposals that he now puts forward for a committee that will have some powers and obviously functions?

Parliament Square (Management) Bill [HL]

Lord Desai Excerpts

Friday 1st July 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Desai]

My Lords, I welcome the efforts of the noble Lord, Lord Marlesford. He and I came to the House at the same time, so we have a special bond of affection. For me, too, this is the fourth or fifth time that I have spoken on this subject. I welcome the Bill because it treats Parliament Square as a particular unit and addresses the current fragmentation of authorities that have bits and pieces of control over the square. The Bill suggests a committee that would co-ordinate what happens in the square.

It is very interesting that Clause 3(b) states that Parliament Square includes,

“the footways that immediately adjoin the central garden of Parliament Square”.

Currently it is the footways that people are occupying: they are not occupying Parliament Square. Finally we have got to a situation where there are restrictions on demonstrating around Parliament Square and where people who want to demonstrate—as they have a perfect right to do—have been pushed to this very scary paved edge of the square. Some of the tents erected are very small, and the variety of protests is quite fascinating. It is not just the old Brian Haw protest about Iraq; there is something about Freemasons murdering somebody and all sorts of interesting things.

Whatever we do to organise Parliament Square, we must foster and encourage people's right to protest. I very much think that we ought not to use these various pieces of legislation as restrictions on people's right to demonstrate. It is a great tribute to our democracy that right across from Parliament people can support causes that often have nothing to do with Parliament but which they feel strongly about and want to bring to Parliament’s attention.

[Lord Cormack]

The noble Lord will remember that only three weeks ago we had a debate on this subject and some of us tried to make the distinction between a place of legitimate protest and a squalid encampment permanently defacing the square. It seems that the elegant solution of my noble friend meets both the noble Lord's concerns and my own.

[Lord Desai]

My Lords, I am coming to that. My background is that of a demonstrator. I demonstrated in Grosvenor Square against the American war in Vietnam, I helped students occupy the LSE and I did various other things.

[Lord Richard]

My noble friend demonstrated in Grosvenor Square, he did not sleep in it. He is making a link between demonstrating and sleeping somewhere in a tent. That seems somewhat tenuous.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Desai]

I am warming up to my solution to the problem. I said in your Lordships' House in a debate on the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill that very often people use the grounds of things being squalid, unruly or unkempt as a way of restricting the right to demonstrate. I am very keen to make quite sure that whatever we do does not restrict that right. The noble Lord has proposed his solution. However, one reason they do not want to go away is that they are afraid that if they do, they will not be allowed to come back the next day. That is very much the fear. They have a tenuous hold on a space in which to demonstrate and they fear losing it.

One thing which the Committee on the Bill could do is not only to accept what is in Clause 2(2)—which all seems terribly negative, not positive—but to allow people to lease rights, as it were, to come back to demonstrate day after day. They should have some sort of assurance that if they go away, they will be able to come back the next day and resume the demonstration. That is important, because all sorts of excuses are made by referring to all sorts of ancient Acts which can be used against people demonstrating.

One elegant solution which my noble friend Lord Campbell-Savours has proposed to me—it was in the Bishops’ Bar, if I may reveal such confidences—is that we should perhaps have a structure within the central garden where people can have stalls that they can book for a week or whatever. They could have their little display there and not on the precarious footpath surrounding Parliament Square. They could have the demonstration and keep their stuff neatly. They will be able to be seen but will have limited tenure in the structure. This was very much not my idea, but I like it very much. I suggest it to the noble Lord whose Bill this is because, in a sense, we want to make it possible for people to demonstrate but remove some of the uglier aspects of the scene. It will work fine if we can have this compromise whereby people have an assurance that they can come back day after day to demonstrate.

If I may go off from my central argument, one has to admire the determination of someone like Brian Haw who came back year after year to demonstrate for the things that he strongly believed in. We might not agree with him, and year after year the Government tried their best to remove him, but he always came back. One has to admire that sort of citizen, who is a valuable person in a democracy. Although I commend the noble Lord’s Bill very much, I hope that in Committee we can add some positive aspects to Clause 2(2). I wish him God-speed on his Bill.

Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill

Lord Desai Excerpts

Thursday 16th June 2011 Lords Chamber

We need this legislation to be as clear as possible and for the freedom to demonstrate to be as enabled as possible.

[Lord Desai]

My Lords, I spoke on this section of the Bill at Second Reading and I very much support the amendment of the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee. If we have subsection (1) of Clause 142 in place, which re-establishes the Public Order Act 1986 as the ruling legislation, the rest of that clause/section is completely unnecessary. We can omit all that. If we have the 1986 Act, all subsequent legislation is not required, including Clause 143 and the rest of the provisions in this section.

[Lord Rosser]

My Lords, I have an amendment in this group but we agree with the repeal of the provisions in the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005 relating to demonstrations in the vicinity of Parliament. We also agree with the need for further proposals and for the use of the 1986 Public Order Act. The 2005 Act created a new offence of demonstrating without authorisation in what is described as a designated area, which was defined by order. That designated area had to be within 1 kilometre of Parliament Square. The use of loudspeakers in the designated area was also banned.

However, that Act had unacceptable and unintended consequences on the right of some to protest and it soon raised concerns that the Act had not, in reality, struck the correct balance between the right to protest and the rights of people to go about their everyday business and for them to enjoy Parliament Square. A proposal to repeal the provisions of the 2005 Act was included in the Constitutional Reform and Governance Bill. That proposal fell in the wash-up at the 2010 general election.

In looking at the Government's proposals we have some questions to raise, simply to test whether they are likely to achieve their objectives. It would certainly be helpful if the Minister could define the problem that the Government feel that their proposals will address, and to define the harm that the Government are trying to deal with. The Government’s proposals are, in many ways, similar to the provisions of the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act but they apply to a much smaller area, namely Parliament Square. How did the Government decide that Parliament Square should be the limit of the area to which their proposals should relate? Although he is not in his place, the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, had amendments proposing, as I understand it, to include Abingdon Green. How would the situation be addressed if those protesting—the permanence of existing protests is an issue—moved just outside the area of Parliament Square?

Do all the parties directly involved support the Government’s proposals, including the Greater London Authority, Westminster City Council, the Metropolitan Police and indeed the House authorities here? Are there any areas of disagreement over the scope or the practicality of the proposals?

We recognise that this is not an easy issue to resolve and that at the end of the day it will not just be about what is or is not in the Bill or any associated documentation. It is also about the degree of common sense—which, hopefully, will be considerable—that will be applied by all concerned in implementing the powers in the Bill.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, with nine clauses to deal with, worrying about a very small traffic island seems on the face of it to be a bit excessive, but I recognise that there is concern about the current situation in Parliament Square, the overkill that SOCPA applied to it and the question of what we put in place as we remove SOCPA. On the problem that we are trying to address and the harm that we are trying to remove, I say to the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, that the democracy encampment actually produced a considerable amount of harm to Parliament Square Garden. The garden, which should be there for the enjoyment of all, is still fenced off, as the noble Lord well knows, and not only tents but some semi-permanent structures now obstruct the pavement.

I also recognise that this is part of a much wider discussion that we need to have, not just on the Bill but about the future of Parliament Square and of this part of Westminster as a whole. We had a useful debate on this on Friday, to which one or two Members here contributed. I recommend that those who were not here on Friday read Hansard. The debate raised some much wider questions to which I hope this Chamber will return, and which I hope that Members of both Houses and the authorities of the Abbey and the Supreme Court will address.

[Lord Desai]

Is there not anxiety on the part of the demonstrators that if they do not have permanent structures they will not be able to come back the next day and demonstrate? They are worried that if they demonstrate only during the day and then go home, the next day the police will say, “You can’t come here”. They are probably trying, in a clumsy way, to establish a right. I quite agree that these structures are ugly but that right is a crucial one to protect, and we should not worry too much about the structures.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, there is no evidence for what the noble Lord has just suggested. We are talking about proportionality in a whole range of different ways here. Parliament Square, Old Palace Yard and the area around them, as some noble Lords were saying on Friday, ought to be a great democratic space to be enjoyed by a large number of people, not just those who come to visit Parliament or those who wish to make their views well known—loudly known—but also tourists and those substantial numbers of people who pass through Parliament Square every day on their way to and from work. It is a transient population that is obstructed by those who wish to be here permanently. Some of those structures are semi-permanent. I think that the noble Lord will agree that if the Aldwych—to take where he and I used to work as an example—had a similarly permanent encampment, there would be real problems of obstruction of the footway and so on.

The question that we are dealing with is: how best to arrange Parliament Square for the enjoyment, and the presence, of the maximum number of people under shared rules for all who come. This is a very large area. The intention of this part of the Bill is to give much greater clarity to protestors, public and the police as to what is and is not acceptable in Parliament Square. As I said on Friday, overnight protests and vigils are clearly one sort of acceptable behaviour. Being there for a year at a time—or, in the case of Brian Haw, several years—is a different sort of presence. It begins to obstruct the rights of others. I am sure that the noble Lord is familiar with John Stuart Mill and On Liberty, and the question of how one’s liberty has not to obstruct the rights of others. The maximum number of people in the democracy encampment was, I think, nearly 150. Brian Haw’s group has always been a mere handful. So we are trading off different rights. That is the purpose of this place.

I therefore say to the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, that scrutiny of this is taking place in a wider context, not simply today. We discussed this on Friday and there is, indeed, another Private Member’s Bill. This will continue to be a large set of issues.

The noble Baroness, Lady Miller, asked whether the policeman was a mind-reader. No, certainly not. Before anyone can commit an offence under these provisions, they must first be issued with a direction to stop: a warning. It is acceptable to issue a warning to someone you see carrying their sleeping bag and various other things that they should not put it down and spend several nights on it. That is what is intended in this clause.

The noble Baroness talks about fears of domestic extremists. I do not particularly want to go down that road beyond saying that I recall that when I once turned up to speak to the Campaign for the Accountability of US Bases in Britain at RAF Menwith Hill, it was remarkable how quickly the MoD policeman appeared to recognise who I was—my name and everything else. Perhaps I am on the list, too. We do not need to go too far into that for the moment.

These amendments rightly test the replacement for SOCPA. The Government’s view is that getting rid of SOCPA and replacing it with measures that existed before—as far as demonstrators are concerned, the previously operating Public Order Acts—is the right response. There is a trade-off between different users, as I have already said. However, there is a clear consensus on all sides of this Chamber after five years of debate that Parliament Square should be fully developed as a democratic space and that we should be discussing with the Palace authorities, the Abbey, the Supreme Court and others how to use it better. That discussion is rather wider than the Bill goes and needs to be continued elsewhere.

The question of Abingdon Green was raised briefly. There are particular problems because Abingdon Green is private, not public, property. Noble Lords will be aware of the many subtleties of who is directly responsible for which bit of the various facilities around here. There are risks of hybridity if we apply this Bill to Abingdon Green. However, we understand the practical challenges in terms of applying these various remedies. The Government will therefore additionally discuss with the House authorities the benefits of moving an amendment on Report to make provision for a power of seizure to be attached to Royal Parks regulations, which apply to Abingdon Green, to support the position that we have taken for effective enforcement of GLA and Westminster City Council by-laws.

Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill

Lord Desai Excerpts

Wednesday 27th April 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Desai]

My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow the noble Lord with whom I came into your Lordships’ Chamber 20 years ago. There is an iron law of British politics that the Home Office introduces the maximum number of Bills in every Parliament. Every Home Office Bill is large and very complex, aims to cure the problems caused by previous Home Office Bills, and goes on to create new problems which subsequent Home Office Bills will have to cure. I do not think that we have seen any break in that iron law so far.

I shall speak only to Part 3. As far as policing goes, my experience is of being in Grosvenor Square in March 1968 and being chased by police horses rather than being on a police horse chasing demonstrators. From that point of view, I would have much preferred this Bill to have got us back to the Public Order Act 1986 and done nothing more. It will be 10 years on 2 June 2011 that Mr Brian Haw has been demonstrating in Parliament Square. He has been there since before 9/11 and before the Iraq war. In the mean time Parliament has—if I may use unparliamentary language—disgraced itself in its behaviour towards what is, after all, a non-violent demonstration. It is squalid; it is dirty; it embarrasses us. But that is the nature of freedom.

Freedom is not designed to have people demonstrate in morning suits, except maybe to go to the royal wedding, for which even the Prime Minister has had to agree to wear a morning suit. But the whole point of the freedom to demonstrate is that it will be embarrassing and troublesome. If we do not grant that freedom, what are we here for? What is the parliament of a free country for if it cannot tolerate a little bit of noise? And it is much less noise than the House of Commons makes itself—but that is beside the point. Is a little bit of noise so inconveniencing to Members of Parliament that we have to ban this, persecuting and prosecuting this man for years on end, and for what purpose? He is not breaking any law. He is not smashing glass windows in Great George Street or anything like that. He is just standing there saying, “It is shocking that 10,000 people, or whatever, have died”.

I supported the Iraq war. I have no compunction in that. I am a humanitarian warmonger, as I have often called myself. But I still feel that if someone wants to demonstrate in Parliament Square, if they do it peacefully and non-violently, they have a fundamental right to do that. It is no good having the Human Rights Act or abiding by the European Convention on Human Rights—as every Minister says he will do on the front of a Bill—if all we are going to do is prosecute innocent people. I have been on the prosecuted side. I have been on civil rights marches in America and on student demonstrations here. I marched against the Vietnam War. I will not forget my past, but I still think that the Bill should retain Clause 142 and junk Clauses 143 to 150.

We do not need a management committee or a clean-up operation. None of that is necessary. If noble Lords watched tourists going by as often as I have—I do not have a car, so I often walk round these premises and streets—they would see that tourists are fascinated that the British political system allows someone to abuse it right in front of Parliament. We should be proud of that. It should be a world heritage site more than anything else. I do not know how much it has cost us to chase this poor single man around the courts and so forth. Since the calculus is how many police officers we can employ, I am sure that we could have employed 10 or 15 police officers for the costs that we have incurred.

I urge the Government even now to go back to their libertarian principles. The Liberal Democrat Party has libertarian principles. The Conservatives were supposed to have libertarian principles once upon a time when I knew them. There is no problem and no harm is being caused. We should leave people alone and let them demonstrate. It is the oldest freedom and one that we have fought for over many centuries. We can once again get back to the sanity of the Public Order Act 1986. When it was passed it was perfectly adequate, and it had long been adequate before the previous Government, I am sad to say, panicked and brought in this SOCPA legislation, which is completely over the top.

There is still a chance to withdraw from all this nonsense and keep Clause 142, which allows for the Public Order Act to come back into operation. That is more than enough. It would be a proud tribute to the libertarian traditions of the coalition, while it lasts.