Tribunals, Courts and Enforcement Bill [HL]

I am grateful to the noble Lord for being very succinct and clear about the issues on which he seeks clarification. I will deal with the detail followed by the generality. New subsection (5)(a) does not apply the power of substitution; it simply reiterates the existing position, which is why it refers to the ““authority””. New subsection (5)(b) refers to the power of substitution. As the noble Lord will see from new subsection (5B), "““a decision substituted … under subsection (5)(b) has effect as if it were a decision of the relevant court or tribunal””." It does not mention ““authority””. I am told that that is how we ensure that this does not apply to areas such as local and national authorities, officials, government Ministers, and so on. I know the noble Lord is concerned about that. That is how Clause 132 reads. New subsection (5)(a) relates to the existing position. New subsection (5)(b) is the substitution. I am told that the civil procedure rules came in in 2000. I hope that that will help the noble Lord. The noble Lord rightly says that the difficulty with the civil procedure rules is that they are unclear and ambiguous. That is why we wanted to make sure that we clarified the position. The evidence suggests that the courts are not using the provision because they consider that it is ambiguous. I am being corrected. The amendment to the CPR was in 2000. I think that that was what I was asked about. We hope that putting the measure in statute will make it clear and give it statutory force rather than making it purely procedural. The measure is deliberately intended to remove the ambiguity. But it is absolutely essential that we understand that it is about the cases where only one decision could properly have been made. I give an example from a tribunal to illustrate the point. A tribunal might decide that a child should not be admitted to a particular class in a school because of a cap on numbers. For whatever reason that decision is overturned and the child is admitted to that class. Rather than incurring the cost—which is sometimes borne by the individual who is trying to get the decision made—of the measure being reviewed with consequent delay taking place, it would be much easier if the relevant decision could simply be substituted. We want to apply the measure in a very limited set of circumstances to clear up the ambiguity in the civil procedure rules. We also want to pick up the Law Commission’s recommendations and ensure that we define the measure as appropriate within the legislation. The noble Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, who has had to leave, asked me to say how much she supports what the Government are doing in this regard. I hope that the noble Lord does not mind my doing that. We believe that we have the balance right here. I hope that the noble Lord will reflect on it. If I can give him any further information, I shall do so.