Conscious of the time, I shall give a quick summary of what the Joint Committee decided by way of stimulating thought on this particularly tricky issue. I think that it is fair to say—I suspect that my noble friend Lord McNally will agree—that this is the single most difficult issue in the whole Bill: what you do about those who post on the internet anonymously? We have already had a considered view from the noble Lord, Lord Phillips of Sudbury, and the noble Earl, Lord Erroll, pointing out the costs attached and how difficult or, perhaps, impossible, it is to identify people who are anonymous.
The committee was given a lot of evidence from people who ran websites saying, “Leave us alone”. We heard evidence from newspaper editors saying, “Leave us alone”. We heard evidence from academics saying, “Don’t leave us alone”. We heard very little evidence from individuals crying “Help!”, but that is what we thought we were empowered to do. We were quite clear about posting on the web. If the name is attached, the law should apply and be pursued. Notwithstanding the self-evident self-interest of some people who gave evidence, we thought that if we know who has done it, they should be held to account for what they did. We did not get into the detail that the Committee has got into, nor should we, but that was the basic position.
When it came to anonymous contributions, everybody told us, “There is nothing you can do about it; it is a world wide web; they could be anywhere. The website could be attached to another website, buried in a third website, ad infinitum. It cannot be handled legally, period. Forget it, Joint Committee, and move on”.
We came to the view that it was pretty difficult to handle this from a legislative point of view. We did not want to engage in argument with those who kept telling us that. On the other hand, we were not willing to just forget about it. Two ideas surfaced. One of them is incorporated in the amendment, which is, in effect, a probing amendment. One way to deal with anonymity would be to rule it out: to say that you can take part only if you are willing to say who you are. That would be a relatively simple solution. I can hear some of the arguments against it even as I stand here, but that does not negate the fact that it is at least an option for the Government to consider.
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The other option, which is not in the amendment but, for all I know, might appear on Report, was to say that there is no legal redress for anonymity. Therefore, why do we not change the culture and legislate in a way that says that if it is anonymous, it cannot have any legal force? Over a period of years, the culture would change to the point where if someone says something on the web and puts their name to it, it is believable, it is actionable or it is in play. However, if something appears and there is no name attached to it, culturally over a period of time, we might say that we do not have to take any account of that because it is anonymous. I think it was the committee’s view that, given the need to offer some protection to whistleblowers, it would be easier to find a way to protect them within an overall structure rather than to try to legislate.
Those two issues got most attention in our committee. I have made it clear that this is a probing amendment to put those issues on the table for the Government to think about and for other noble Lords to comment on if they wish. At this stage, the committee was not seeking to persuade the Government specifically but it was anxious that the Government should not simply follow those who say, “Leave us alone; it’s worldwide; it’s totally impossible; walk away”. Perhaps, ultimately, your Lordships will come to the view that the decision has to be to walk away. But we thought that some other issues should be explored before that decision was reached. I beg to move.