Compensation Bill [HL]

My Lords, I now understand the reaction when I was talking about Amendment No. 3. I had not read this properly and I did not realise that it could be read, quite rightly, as protecting a landowner against people running down a footpath and so on. I entirely agree with the amendment. I believe that we should pass it and if it needs tidying up, just as with Amendment No. 4, it can be revisited behind the scenes before Third Reading. This is a problem of not being able to push matters harder in Grand Committee. One ends up pushing amendments harder on Report, when one should be tidying up what has happened in Committee. We should not have amendments at Third Reading, unless they are absolutely necessary for further tidying up after Report stage. Everything is being delayed a stage and the principle makes the situation dangerous. We have to push amendments on Report in case they are not brought forward at Third Reading and we know that tidying up is required as a result of discussion with parliamentary counsel. I believe that we should definitely pass this amendment and do some tidying up with parliamentary counsel. The amendment covers the problem of burglars injuring themselves. Although I accept that this would not cover someone deliberately setting a man trap—perhaps rightly—it would protect one against a burglar falling through a roof or some particularly stupid act, the burglar having taken a difficult route. Paragraph (b) covers something that I am worried about: people coming on to land and carrying out perfectly lawful activities. The only point about which we need to be careful—this may need tidying up but I think we should pass what is here first—is that we should not, for example, require a signature on a form from everyone to say that they accept the risk. Also we should not require a plethora of signs around the countryside saying, ““If you run down this footpath you do so at your own risk””. We should have common sense about such matters. Nowadays everyone complains about street furniture, saying that drivers are so distracted by a plethora of signs that they do not know what they should do, which results in accidents. Equally, if one goes into the countryside and is greeted by 101 signs at the beginning of every footpath or every possible cross-country entry to a footpath, saying, ““Watch you do not get bitten by adders””, or ““Do not disturb the wildlife””, one does so at one’s own risk. By passing a sign, one is willingly accepting that it is at one’s own risk but what do you do about those who cannot read? Does the sign need to be in Braille for the unsighted? The height of the sign will probably matter in case someone is in a wheelchair, as we know from the NERC Bill. We have to accept that ““willingly accepted”” implies a notion of common sense and that signatures on forms will not be required. With the suggestion that a statement to that effect would be wonderful, I think this is a very good amendment.