Coroners and Justice Bill

As the Minister said, during the sixth day of Committee, on 9 July I moved amendments to abolish the common law offences of criminal libel and seditious libel. I there fully set out the history of those ancient crimes and their effect on freedom of expression. My amendments were supported across the House by the noble Baroness, Lady D'Souza, Lord Kingsland, my noble friend Lord Thomas of Gresford and, indeed, by the Minister, the noble Lord, Lord Bach. The late and great Lord Kingsland reminded the House at column 849 that the laws of seditious and criminal libel are very active in other countries. He said: ""Some of them look at us and say, ‘You have them, so why shouldn’t we have them? It is up to us whether we should use them’.".—[Official Report, 9/7/09; col. 849.]" Lord Kingsland referred to Turkey, Iran and Uzbekistan, and I would add that there are Commonwealth countries in Asia and Africa where those laws are used to suppress political dissent and criticism. The Minister reminded us again that the offences are arcane, stemming from a bygone age when freedom of expression was not seen as the right that it is today. He has rightly recognised that taking the initiative to abolish those offences is a positive step in helping the UK to take a lead in challenging similar laws in other countries, where they are used to suppress free speech. He has today fulfilled the undertaking that he made on the Government's behalf to propose amendments in time for today that extend the abolition of those offences to Northern Ireland and take the opportunity to abolish the obsolete offence of obscene libel. The Government have been true to their promise, and today is a day to celebrate. I should declare an interest in the debate as a vice-president of English PEN, and I should say that the abolition of these offences is welcomed by English PEN, Article 19 and Index on Censorship, which campaigned for these reforms. It is also welcomed by my colleague Dr Evan Harris MP, who took up the issue in the other place. So much for Amendment 67, but while I am on my feet, I will, if I may, speak also to Amendment 75A on blasphemy. I should declare an interest in that amendment, given that I was counsel in the Satanic Verses case for Penguin Books, when an attempt was made by an Iranian businessman to extend the law of blasphemy to protect Islam. That attempt was rejected by the Divisional Court. The three common law offences of seditious libel, criminal libel and obscene libel were fashioned by the court of the Star Chamber and spread their tentacles widely. The fourth of the quartet of offences was blasphemous libel. During the passage of the Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill in 2008, as the noble Lord, Lord Bach, mentioned, the Government agreed to abolish the offences of blasphemy and blasphemous libel under the common law of England and Wales. I am sorry that my noble friend Lord Avebury cannot be in his place today because of an injury; he was one of those who campaigned long and hard for that reform. I was unable to be present during the debate in the House on 5 March 2008, when the noble Baroness, Lady Andrews, said that the law had fallen into disuse and ran the risk of bringing the law as a whole into disrepute. She pointed out that we now have legislation to protect individuals on the grounds of religion and belief, and she referred to a letter from the most reverend Primates the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, in which they explained: ""Having signalled for more than 20 years that the blasphemy laws could, in the right context, be abolished, the Church is not going to oppose abolition now"." They added the rider, ""provided we can be assured that provisions are in place to afford the necessary protection to individuals and to society"." The Minister stated her belief that, ""the offences of blasphemy and blasphemous libel are unworkable in today’s society because they do not protect the individual or groups of people, they do not protect our fundamental rights—indeed, they may conflict with them—and they do not protect the sacred. That last point is very much reinforced by the recent judgment in the Jerry Springer case".—[Official Report, 5/3/08; col. 1119.]" Later in her speech, the Minister referred to the reports of the Select Committee on Religious Offences in 2003 and to the report of the Joint Committee on Human Rights, of which I am a member, of January 2008, which concluded that the offences could no longer be justified. She noted that the new criminal offences outlawing incitement to religious hatred in the Racial and Religious Hatred Act 2006 and the new law against discrimination on grounds of religion and belief gave modern protection. She made it clear that, in the words of the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Southwark, who I am delighted to see in his place, the repeal of these offences, ""should not be interpreted as a secularising move or as a general licence to attack or insult religious beliefs"." I wholly concur with that view. There was then a full a debate and the House decided by 148 votes to 87 to abolish these offences. The other place overwhelmingly agreed by 378 votes to 57. There has been no example of any problem occurring as a result. However, the abolition of the offence of blasphemy was not extended to Northern Ireland, which is the reason for my amendment. We are being asked to agree to abolish seditious, obscene and criminal libel, not only in England and Wales but in Northern Ireland, but not blasphemous libel. It is my submission that we should do so also for blasphemous libel, and I am greatly fortified by the support given by the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Eames, and my noble friend Lord Alderdice. I am a great admirer of the people of Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic, and of their traditions. We have had our holiday home in West Cork for 35 years, and I have been a frequent adviser and visitor in Northern Ireland since 1975, although I would still be described by any Irishman as a "blow in" from England. There are particular reasons why the common law offences can safely be repealed in Northern Ireland. I wish briefly to deal with them, as this is quite important. The Select Committee on Religious Offences of this House noted in its report that blasphemy in Northern Ireland came from the common law of Ireland. However, it reported that it was arguable that the offence did not survive the disestablishment of the Church of Ireland by the Irish Church Act of 1869. It pointed out that there had been no reported prosecution for blasphemy in Northern Ireland. That is an important point: it is not even clear that there is a blasphemy offence in Northern Ireland now. The Select Committee also pointed out that Northern Ireland has had a criminal offence of incitement to religious hatred since 1987, under the Public Order (Northern Ireland) Order 1987, although it has rarely been used. The offence of incitement to religious hatred in Northern Ireland is much broader than the offence in England and Wales. It protects not only against speech that is threatening but against speech that is abusive and insulting. It includes situations in which the defendant does not intend to stir up hatred or to arouse fear but where, in all the circumstances, hatred is likely to be stirred up or aroused. It does not contain the free speech clause that, as the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Wirral, will be well aware, we inserted into the Racial and Religious Hatred Act 2006 to ensure that our law did not prevent discussion, criticism, ridicule or insult of religious beliefs and practices. This House accepted the abolition of blasphemy on the ground that the new law on hatred provided adequate protection for religion and religious believers. Given that there is greater protection on the statute book against incitement to religious hatred in Northern Ireland, the same argument applies with even greater strength. There is no gap in the legislation; indeed, some would argue that the legislation is overbroad. Some may argue that Parliament should wait for the policing and justice powers to be devolved to Stormont before this arcane offence should be abolished. I respectfully submit that, if we can abolish sedition, criminal libel and obscene libel in Northern Ireland without waiting for the powers to be devolved, it is difficult to understand why, in the circumstances that I have summarised, this offence, too, should not be abolished in Northern Ireland. There is another reason why it would be bizarre not to apply the abolition to Northern Ireland. If this becomes comical, it is not my fault. Several years ago, the Supreme Court of Ireland declared that the offence existed to protect the Church of England as the established church and that, therefore, as Ireland does not have an established church, the offence—partly in view of its vagueness—had no application to the Republic. Therefore, the Supreme Court of Ireland abolished blasphemy by judgment, as it were. We in this House relied on that decision as part of the argument for abolishing the offence in this country. Another argument was based on its divisive nature in protecting Christianity and not other faiths, such as Islam. This summer, the Attorney-General of Ireland decided that Eamonn de Valera’s 1937 constitution requires that blasphemy should be a punishable offence. The Irish Government did not wish to have a referendum to amend the constitution to remove that anomaly but instead amended the Defamation Bill not only to abolish the common-law offences of defamatory libel, seditious libel and obscene libel but to create a statutory offence of publishing or uttering blasphemous matter that is, ""grossly abusive or insulting in relation to matters held sacred by any religion, thereby causing outrage among a substantial number of the adherents of that religion"," where there is the necessary intent. That provoked huge controversy and was hurried through the Irish Parliament with no proper debate. It would surely be bizarre to have a situation in which the common-law offences are abolished in England and Wales, and by the Supreme Court of Ireland in the Irish Republic, but revived by statute in the Republic and left in a vague and unenforceable condition in Northern Ireland, where, as I have emphasised, there is a strong statutory offence that has existed since 1987. I hope that the House will be willing to bury this ghost of the Star Chamber in Northern Ireland, as we are doing with the other three ghosts.