Policing and Crime Bill

My Lords, Amendment 152 Alpha Kiwi Zulu Bravo—these amendments are getting rather long, aren’t they?—essentially introduces an explicit provision that the detention of property must be constantly reviewed and that the property must be released if the detention provision is no longer met. Your Lordships will note that there are already a number of safeguards that accompany these new powers in recognition of the need to ensure their focused and proportionate use. The conditions for exercising the seizure power are set out in new Sections 47 Bravo and 47 Charlie(1). These require that an individual has been arrested, or proceedings have begun against him, and there is reasonable cause to believe that he has benefited from the offence. The officer must also have reasonable grounds to suspect that the property may be made unavailable for satisfying a confiscation order or that the value of that property may be diminished. In the other place, in recognition of the constructive debates on the powers, we introduced an amendment to place an explicit duty on an appropriate officer to release detained property if the conditions and reasons for its initial seizure no longer existed. This duty is set out in new Section 47R(2). I am satisfied that an explicit power to release property if it no longer meets the detention condition provides an implicit duty that the position must be reviewed regularly. In addition, we will ensure that a duty to review detention is included in the code of practice that has to be introduced under new Section 47S. We have already made such a commitment in the government reply to the 10th and 15th reports from the Joint Committee on Human Rights of Session 2008-09. Annexe B of that document sets out a draft skeleton for the code of practice. Significantly, a passage in it addresses the point, stating: ""Ongoing consideration of the validity of the detention and duty to release if detention conditions no longer met. A senior officer undertaking a formal review of continued detention every three months"." Your Lordships will note that the quote I have just given is not in full, grammatical English. That was not because I read it incorrectly, but because the skeleton code was drafted with bullet points rather than with full sentences. Your Lordships will have the opportunity to scrutinise the code of practice before the powers come into force. The order bringing the code into force is subject to an affirmative resolution of both Houses. In conclusion, I suggest that the provision that we have introduced, together with the requirement in the code of practice for a senior officer to conduct a review of the detention condition every three months, amounts to a strong and sufficient safeguard and certainly meets the spirit of the amendment. I fully appreciate the concerns expressed about controlling the new power of search, seizure and detention—indeed, I share them—but I am satisfied that there are sufficient safeguards and that the points raised by the noble Baroness are already addressed. In the light of my explanation, I hope that she can with withdraw her amendment.