Serious Crime Bill [HL]

moved Amendment No. 95: 95: Clause 40, page 25, line 16, leave out ““believes”” and insert ““has reasonable grounds to believe”” The noble Lord said: I shall speak also to Amendment No. 96 and the Liberal Democrats’ Amendments Nos. 95B and 96B in this group.Clause 40 creates a new offence of encouraging or assisting an offence believing that it will be committed. It sets out what a person must do to commit the offence: "““(a) he does an act capable of encouraging or assisting the commission of an offence; and""(b) he believes—""(i) that the offences will be committed; and""(ii) that his act will encourage or assist its commission””." The Government have consulted on whether the offence in Clause 40 should be widened. The majority of responses to question 5 in the consultation paper—new powers against organised and financial crime—were from police forces, banks and building societies. The Government’s summary of responses reported that the majority of respondents thoughtit right to criminalise the behaviour covered byClause 40. However, opinions differed on the exact behaviour that should be criminalised. Responses were split between those who felt that the offence should be restricted to people who believe that an offence will be committed, as suggested by the Law Commission, and those who thought that it should be widened as the Government have suggested. Indeed, it seems that slightly more respondents favoured the Government's position. Strong arguments were put forward both by those in favour of restricting the offence and by those in favour of extending it. The main reason put forward in favour of widening the offence was a concern that belief would be difficult to prove. There was concern that this could be given a narrow interpretation by the courts. As a result, several respondents put forward alternative suggestions, including that which forms the text of our amendments, covering those with ““reasonable grounds to believe””. We have tabled the amendments to ask the Minister to put on record the Government’s reasoning behind their rejection ofthe wider interpretation of the offence. We agree with the Government’s approach set out in their response to the consultation that the clause should not cover any person who has only the slightest idea that what he does might encourage or assist another to commit that offence, but that it should ensure that a person who commits an act capable of encouraging or assisting cannot avoid prosecution on conviction for the offence by claiming that, although he had a strong suspicion that the other person would commit an offence, he did not believe that that person would. I beg to move.