National Security (State Threats) Bill

Baroness Neville-Jones Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 23rd June 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Neville-Jones (Con)]

My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Barrow. I agree with his comments. Like him, I welcome the Bill, and, like him, I think we have been waiting a long time for it. It is not just that it seems to have taken the Government a long time to get going on the issue; it is that real life affects those who are at risk, not only the Jewish community but certainly and definitely that community, so we need to get on with this legislation, and I am therefore among those who do not support further delay.

The points made by the noble Lord, Lord Anderson—for me, they introduce a new element, but one that quite clearly has real force—require us to try to get a balance between, on the one hand, contact with organisations of which we deeply disapprove and whose activities are malign, but for purposes that serve our interests and which are for the general good, and, on the other, not creating loopholes by inventing, if I can put it that way, motives that would lead to the courts excusing their conduct. It is not difficult to see that a defence could make it quite difficult for the prosecution to land its point if there is an argument in court about motivation and it has to prove that it was for a prohibited purpose. One thing that we need to concentrate on in the short time we have is getting some careful drafting into the legislation to get the balance right.

The Minister said, and I see his point, that he could not guarantee that this legislation would actually lead to the proscription of the IRGC. All I can say is that, in the real world, if it does not lead to that, there is something very wrong. I would expect to see that happen. We do live, I think, in the real world, not in one that is composed of nicer situations than actually prevail.

On the prohibited purpose requirement, as I say, it is obvious that we need careful drafting, but that applies also to the provision on prosecution regarding the risk of people planning activities in this country for malign activity abroad. Again, it is not difficult to see that, unless it is possible to land the point, the defence will have quite a good time arguing about motive. When this legislation is passed, we must not get into a situation where it turns out to be a great deal less effective than it should have been because we put into it clauses that enabled the defence of these individuals to make a monkey, if I can put it that way, of the legislation that we put in place.

Finally, I think it was my noble friend Lord Pickles who made an important point about future-proofing. We should try to include in this legislation individuals who are not directed by or acting under the influence of an organisation but who are themselves motivated to support state organisations, so that we can also convict them. If one looks at current terrorist activity, it is very clear that the self-motivated individual is a feature of the threat scene. It is important that we should try to include people acting on their own authority in this legislation. It is an important Bill. I support getting it through but I hope we will not do this at the expense of getting the provisions and the balance of the legislation right.