Racial and Religious Hatred Bill

My Lords, as so often during the long life of these proposals, I speak not in anger but in sorrow. I hope this will not be taken as a partisan point, but our starting point for this latest journey was not very promising. I am reminded of the old joke where one man asks another for directions and, after a pause, his interlocutor begins by saying, ““Well, you wouldn’t want to be starting from here””. Unfortunately, Ministers made a fundamental mistake by attempting to amend the Public Order Act 1986 by effectively adding ““religious”” to ““racial”” throughout the existing offences. That misjudged attempt to equate religion with race started this entire debate off on the wrong track. It has taken a lot of effort, courage and patience, not least on the part of Ministers, to get the debate on to the right track. I readily pay tribute to Ministers for their willingness to listen and to restructure this fundamental aspect of their original approach. As the Minister pointed out, as soon as Ministers agreed that the proposed new offence of inciting religious hatred should appear separately as a new schedule to the 1986 Act, the possibility of reaching a consensus was created. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, for the short debate we have just had on his amendment which reinforces that point. Suddenly, it became possible to fine-tune the religious hatred offence without also reopening the 1986 settlement on racial hatred. At a stroke, a broad consensus here and in another place seemed not only attainable in principle, but tantalisingly close in practice. As we return this rewritten Bill to the other place, I fervently hope that its Members will think again and endorse our view that a person’s race and his or her religion are quite different qualities. Race is innate. In a liberal democracy, it must be an article, if not of faith, then surely of the fundamental foundations of our political discourse, that beliefs are a matter of individual choice. Adherence to a faith, belief or set of beliefs is about ideas and should not be elevated in law to a higher plain than any other idea or ideas. That is why on 25 October this House made its position very clear indeed. The Bill in its original form was overwhelmingly rejected and an amended version was adopted, with support from every part of this House. That, I believe, was the House of Lords at its best, in its traditional role of amending and improving legislation and defending civil liberties. Since then some very important and detailed discussions have taken place. I thought it might be helpful if I set out my response to the noble Baroness. Just as Ministers conceded ground and accepted both our amended structure and substantive aspects of the revised Bill, so we on these Benches have moved too. We did so at the outset, by conceding the principle that any such Bill should be passed at all. Although we on these Benches certainly agree that there should be no right to stir up hatred of people, on the whole we continue to believe that the existing law covers this perfectly adequately. That was underlined by the recent travails of Sir Iqbal Sacranie, the head of the Muslim Council of Britain, who was apparently investigated by the Metropolitan Police after expressing negative views about homosexuality. We really must do everything we can to ensure that this new legislation is not open to abuse. It must not open the floodgates to a mass of frivolous complaints, much wasting of police time and pointless inconvenience and worry for those who express trenchant views about religion. However, as the great Rab Butler once said, politics is the art of the possible. The Labour Party won the last election and committed itself to legislate in this area—and we all remember the terms of the Labour manifesto. During our meetings with Ministers, I confirm that it soon became clear we were all seeking to achieve the same objective; namely, absolute clarity in the Bill that any new offence should capture the stirring-up of hatred against people and not beliefs or practices. Throughout there was a lot of good will on all sides. Shortly before Christmas, it seemed that that good will might manifest itself in a more concrete form in the shape of an agreement on the Bill. Alas that did not prove possible. The concessions offered by Ministers were by no means perfect, but they were a major improvement on the original Bill. I should like to pay tribute to everyone involved because there was no shortage of constructive contributions. The noble Lord, Lord Lester, and I believe strongly that this matter is above party politics, and it was treated with the seriousness it deserves. Between us we constructed a bridge, both halves of which reached almost halfway across the chasm that had existed between the two sides. Unfortunately, that is never quite good enough. I should like to pay particular tribute to the noble Baroness, Lady Scotland, who has been unfailingly courteous and patient. I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Lester, whose wise counsel never faltered. I pay tribute also to colleagues in another place, especially Dominic Grieve, but also Mark Oaten and the Home Secretary, Charles Clarke. All have combined an adherence to principle with a genuine willingness to engage and to compromise where possible. The sticking points, however, soon became all too apparent. In order to allow ideas and free debate to flourish, it is essential that we should retain our right to criticise—even as hateful—beliefs and practices of every kind, be they secular or religious. That means retaining the right to cause a sense of insult, and also to say things that might seem abusive. I am afraid that that is why those two words, ““abusive”” and, especially, ““insulting””, even when clearly confined to the offence of stirring up hatred against people, continue to cause these Benches such difficulties. They involve the creation of a new criminal offence that could result in people being imprisoned through causing insult alone in this controversial area of religion and politics. That is the rock on which agreement foundered. There will be a chilling effect from this legislation—there will inevitably be self-censorship—and the burden of minimising that will fall heavily on the freedom of expression clause in this Bill. The inclusion of the so-called ““PEN amendment”” in the amended Bill demonstrates just how seriously we in this House take our responsibilities for protecting freedom of expression. In conclusion, Members of this House have walked a long and winding road together and I pay tribute to all noble Lords who have participated in the debate. The end of the road seems at last in sight. I say without shame, embarrassment or false modesty that this House has improved the Bill immeasurably. We are sending back to the other place a far better Bill than the one that it handed to us a few months ago. I hope that the other place agrees.