Racial and Religious Hatred Bill

My Lords, it is a great privilege to be among the Lords Spiritual and the Lords Temporal. Those opposite sit on the Spiritual Benches and I wondered whether the Bill is a spiritual or a temporal Bill. I believe that it is a spiritual Bill and therefore the word ““ism”” comes into it, as other noble Lords have mentioned. An ““ism”” is intangible: it is like a Peter Pan, a belief or an idea—a shifting, whispering sand. I am only here—a Baron on this barren Bench—having taken an oath of allegiance to Her Majesty for the past 42 years or so, which is one year less than I have been a member of the MCC. I never realised that there were many unifying factors which dealt with race and religion, although of course cricket is one of the most important. With regard to the oath of allegiance, I thought of Her Majesty’s responsibilities. I wanted to remind your Lordships not of the great days of the Empire but of the fact that it was our investments and trade which created the multicultural society that we have today. The map, which was pink when I was born, was quite remarkable. I asked myself: what are our duties with this English language, which is now spoken as the first or second language or is being learnt by 3 billion people around the world? We are now legislating in the English language, which could be misinterpreted at will. I reminded myself that 29 per cent of the world’s population today are members of the British Commonwealth—that is quite significant—and that they cover 20 per cent of the Earth’s surface. Therefore, what we debate and discuss today may go further than these shores alone. I wondered why one of the most moving things in relation to these debates that have gone on over the years was the crowd outside Buckingham Palace and those walking down the Mall on the occasion of Her Majesty’s Jubilee. That is what religious and racial harmony are about, and no piece of legislation—no words—can make that possible. I was concerned about the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor having the awful job of introducing useless pieces of legislation, one after the other. I always thought that ultimately legislation was down to written or spoken words and so I tried to find out what were these words that could cause such damage to society. I spent a good chunk of the weekend downstairs at Waterstone’s interviewing as many ethnic groups as I could. I asked what the inflammatory words were that could cause such hatred, but I was told that we should perhaps begin nearer to home with Erskine May. For the record, I remind your Lordships that Erskine May states very simply:"““Good temper and moderation are the characteristics of parliamentary language””—" it is hoped, of all language."““Offensive expressions against the character and conduct of Parliament itself are not permitted, since not only are they a contempt, but they may also tend to degrade the legislature in the public estimation””." The legislature is so degraded in public estimation that perhaps it should become part of the Bill. Expressions which are unparliamentary and call for prompt interference include:"““Abusive and insulting language of a nature likely to create disorder””." That could be a Bill because we are only concerned about ““incitement”” or ““winding people up””. I started part of my working life in a company that carried out the original race relations study in the 1960s. I had various jobs around the world. I had traced the Silk Route and had been in almost all the religious areas where I had to describe to myself the religion of the people because they could not tell me what it was. I often had to speak when there were no bishops around. In my time, I had to deal with the problem in Iran over the Satanic Verses and sit with my team of mullahs and specialist advisers. I then made the mistake, when someone introduced me to a mufti, of thinking that we were talking about someone in plain clothes. I have made many mistakes in relation to the different religions. As I went along the Pilgrim Route, I found that effectively one came back to the phrase: ““And the word was with God”” because almost all religion is spread by the word. We now need to spread the word. There is no need for this Bill but it has been a good day out at the races. I end by saying to the Government that all that is needed is a code of practice approved by every religion. The following code of practice is used in the construction industry:"““No employee or job applicant will be less favourably treated than another on the grounds of their sex, sexual orientation, marital status, religion, race, nationality, ethnic or national origin, colour or disability””." Finally, on football, Celtic and Rangers have been promoted today, as well as Hibs and Hearts, but we must return also to Liverpool, Manchester City and Manchester United. But we have left out one of the faiths: we ought to talk about the Yids. ““Yid”” is not an insulting word; the English dictionary defines it as someone who speaks Yiddish. The Yids are an extremely good football team. Noble Lords will know which one I mean—I have supported it from time to time—and will appreciate that I have brought in yet another ethnic group.