Powers of Entry etc. Bill [HL]

This is a composite group of amendments. I shall start with the proposed code of practice. The noble Lord, Lord Brett, told us at Second Reading that the Government have been working on such a code of practice. What sort of code of practice will it be? As I understand it—I am sure that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Scott, will correct me if I am wrong—there are three kinds of code of practice. One creates an absolute offence for not obeying it. Another is taken into account in a criminal prosecution. The third just lies around and nobody quite knows what happens to it, but I understand that it has no legal force. The noble Lord, Lord Brett, told us at Second Reading that there are 1,208 powers of entry contained in 295 statutes and 286 statutory instruments. Since 1977, Parliament has passed 79 Acts and 220 statutory instruments containing references to powers of entry. One would assume that most of the officers authorised by these various Acts of Parliament to have powers of entry would already have by virtue of their employment some kind of identification card saying, at the very least, what organisation they belong to. Have my noble friend and the Minister identified any people authorised by the various Acts and statutory instruments who do have not some form of identification showing where they come from? It is all very well for the known powers of entry to be exhibited on the Home Office website, but it is clear that my noble friend Lord Selsdon wants in his Bill rather more than that: he wants them to be in an Act of Parliament. The amendment, which would leave out the schedule and replace it with a new one, may or may not be up to date—I have not checked every one with the Home Office website, nor do I know whether the Home Office website is up to date. At Second Reading, I asked a similar question: whether the list in my noble friend’s original schedule was complete and up to date. Whether it is or not, there is no way, should the Bill eventually—perhaps in a slightly amended form—get on to the statute book, to alter the schedule. One would have thought that this was an absolute necessity, because I cannot for the life of me imagine that we have seen the end of new powers of entry getting on to the statute book. The schedule will need fairly regular updating. Although Oppositions regularly call for affirmative instruments to introduce this, that or the other operative part of an Act that has been passed by both Houses of Parliament, it would on this occasion be a mistake to have proposed subsection (8) in the new clause. I would be far happier if, rather than being subject to affirmative instrument, the order was just subject to annulment. I observe that another statutory instrument creeps into this group of amendments, in subsection (4) of the new clause proposed by Amendment 3, on identification cards. Identification cards, if they are necessary, should most certainly have an affirmative instrument.