I should begin by declaring an interest, which is in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests: I am the chair and founder member of a charity. We do not need to read what Sir Stuart Etherington thinks might happen, because I can say what I think might happen on the basis of my experience as a trustee and the chair of a charity.
Having listened to the debate today, I am even more convinced about how I shall respond if my chief executive comes to me and says, “We should get involved, because this is a great year in which to influence politics and people on the issue that we care about, that of children and babies. This is our moment: MPs are at their most open, and we can gain access to them and talk to them. It is absolutely wonderful.” I shall say, unreservedly and without equivocation, “Do not go anywhere near this just because that nice Mr Brake—that nice Deputy Leader of the House—has said that it is all going to be okay.”
If it were to be left to the Deputy Leader of the House to decide on these matters, I would be entirely reassured. I would not even be on my feet, because I trust the right hon. Gentleman implicitly on a personal level. The problem is that it will not be the Deputy Leader of the House who makes the decisions. Someone in a wig and gown down the road will decide what should happen in Stevenage if a certain body has said, “I want to show you the results of an historic vote that took place a while ago; I want to show you which Members of Parliament were for and which were against.”
I know that we have already had that debate. I apologise for intervening earlier on the hon. Member for Stevenage (Stephen McPartland), but I realise that he is one of those Members who appreciate a dialogue in the Chamber rather than a monologue, and I think we both reached the conclusion that neither of us actually knew what the outcome would be. So we are going to employ our own solicitors to decide. It might be a very tight election in Stevenage; the hon. Gentleman might win by a handful over a Labour candidate who was desperate to kill, personally, as many badgers as he could lay his hands on.
This might be very significant, therefore. Situations such as an intervention by someone on—to be less humorous—an anti-racist platform or a pro-racist platform who says something totally outwith what the hon. Gentleman would want said on his behalf will start to influence our politics. It will not be well-meaning, good-hearted people in this House who decide on that. It will be people outside it; it will be people in the judiciary. They will not be taking the cases, however. The people who will be taking the cases will be people who are vexatious—people who normally do not like each other, people who are on opposite sides of a political, social or environmental argument. They will be pro-frackers and anti-frackers. They will be the League Against Cruel Sports and the Countryside Alliance. These guys do not lie down easily together. They will take opportunities to get hold of somebody and change our politics in a particular way; they have proven already in the right way that they are prepared to do that and long may that
continue. It is something we should encourage. Those people should not be chilled from undertaking activities and campaigning in election year, and that should certainly not be the case for the broader range of people—the Royal British Legion, Civil Society, those in the big society and the third sector. These people are our lifeblood. They are the people who have supported us, and they include people who are affiliated to political parties as well. They are people who care about out politics and our democracy. It is those people, as well as my charity, who I will not allow to enter the minefield we today are in danger of creating.