Equality Bill [HL]

The noble Earl leads me into a bit of sinning, and I shall now sin. I am not sure whether I am allowed to say this, but I shall say it as it is more than 30 years after the relevant events and I am self-authorising myself under what was then the Official Secrets Act. The position is quite simple. I had to attend before the then Attorney-General who agreed with me that the drafting was wrong. I said, ““That is fine. I shall report back to the Home Secretary””. The Attorney-General said, ““That is not fine because I have no authority over parliamentary counsel””. I asked, ““What do I do now?””. He replied, ““You will have to go to the Prime Minister””. At which point, I went back to the Home Secretary and said, ““I   do not think that you can go to Harold Wilson on a drafting point on Section 1(1)(b) of the Bill. We will have to accept it””. It is fair to say that current parliamentary counsel have told me that they do not behave in that way any more, but that is what happened at the time, and we tried really hard. That is why, having looked at the appalling, avoidable litigation, the words ““requirement”” and ““condition””, with case law being an absolute bar on that kind of thing, have been extremely restrictive against black people and women and ought not to be continued. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment, by leave, withdrawn. [Amendment No. 171A not moved.] Clause 46 agreed to. Clause 47 [Harassment]: [Amendments Nos. 172 and 173 not moved.]