Coroners and Justice Bill

I thank noble Lords for supporting the amendments and for doing so rigorously with lots of evidence. I also thank again the Minister both for meeting us the other week and for his consideration of the many points that have been made. As he said, he could anticipate that I would not be satisfied by his response in so far as many of us have responded to his points and given good reasons for another law being needed. None of us wants extra laws for the sake of them, but we should acknowledge that times change and that we encounter situations which need new responses. The Minister mentioned that existing offences could be used to deal, for example, with the case that we cited earlier. However, theft, fraud, sexual assault and employment legislation are a whole bundle of different bits of the law, which is where the problem lies. It is not that there are not bits of the law that are capable of dealing with those specific instances of oppression, but putting them together to make a coherent case then becomes difficult and acts as a disincentive to the police to pursue them. I agree that it is essential that the police are absolutely clear about the nature of the law were it to be introduced and are given specific guidelines on how to make sure that prosecutions are brought about, because we have all acknowledged that there is a problem. On trafficking, we acknowledge that pieces of that legislation are appropriate, but not everybody who we are talking about has been trafficked—that is a very important point. I thank the Minister for agreeing to a number of suggestions made by other noble Lords. I shall think about what has been said and decide whether to pursue the matter to a Division on Report. I shall look carefully at Hansard. I will be waiting to hear from the Minister on ACPO and on the other points that he has agreed to take up during the summer break. Bearing that in mind, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment 182 withdrawn. Amendment 183 not moved. Sitting suspended.