My Lords, sunset clauses are never popular with governments and I suspect not too popular with Members of the House at this time of night either. I will accordingly not detain the House for long on this, and I do not intend to put the amendment to the vote. However, I ask the Government seriously to consider it given the magnitude of the change under whatever form this Bill now takes. Whether it rests
with the amendments agreed today by your Lordships’ House or it comes back to us from the House of Commons in a somewhat different form, it is in any view still a major change in our system of justice. It is one that should be monitored as it takes effect over a period.
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I hope, therefore, that the Government will, in principle, if not explicitly tonight, consider and ultimately accept that in these exceptional circumstances it would be proper to have a sunset clause to ensure careful scrutiny of the operation of these new provisions along the lines suggested in the amendment. The amendment embodies not only a period of five years, which is long enough to allow the workings of the new legislation, in whatever form it emerges, to be adequately assessed, but also requires that the process should be conducted by a parliamentary Select Committee established for that purpose.
It is not necessary for me to take up your Lordships’ time by rehearsing all the arguments that we have heard over these weeks, and particularly in the impassioned but reasoned debates that we have had today, to emphasise the concern that is widely shared within and outside this House about the operation of these new provisions. It would give some comfort to those who are genuinely concerned about the implications of the measures to know that scrutiny and monitoring would be required if ultimately a sunset clause were to be applied in the way suggested in the amendment.
I do not intend to test the opinion of the House tonight but I hope the Government will consider the amendment in the spirit of the Deputy Prime Minister’s remarks yesterday because it would complement the approach he adumbrated, the effect of which we await with interest. I beg to move.