Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill

I will make a brief attempt to answer the noble Lord, but I hope that he will be content with the fact that we are going to look at this again. No doubt discussion will take place in the usual way. The problem has been that Section 32(1) requires the Secretary of State to act pursuant to a Parole Board recommendation to recall a lifer. Section 32(2) was the exception allowing the Secretary of State to revoke the licence and recall the lifer without consulting the Parole Board only where expedient in the public interest. As events have turned out—I have no figures—the vast majority of recalls for lifers have been under Section 32(2), not under Section 32(1). Concern has been expressed that, because the recalls are under Section 32(2), those who have been called back may regularly and on a large number of bases go to the court to say that it was not necessary for Section 32(2) to be used because it was not expedient in the public interest—in other words, there was no emergency. In that event, the attempt in the new provisions, which we will take away and look at again, was, as my noble friend said in answer to the previous set of amendments, to regularise what is actually happening; that was the thinking behind them. That is as far as I want to go in answering the noble Lord today. Clause 31 agreed to. Clause 32 agreed to. Clause 33 [Removal under Criminal Justice Act 1991 (offences before 4th April 2005 etc.)]: [Amendment No. 99 not moved.] Clause 33 agreed to. Clause 34 [Removal under Criminal Justice Act 2003]: [Amendment No. 100 not moved.] Clause 34 agreed to. Clause 35 [Referral conditions]: