My noble friend Lord Harris of Haringey has made the very powerful point that, frankly, everything depends on how intelligently or otherwise community protection notices are sought and applied and—to use the Minister’s words—whether anybody is acting mischievously in trying to seek or impose these notices. I am sure that when the Minister responds to the debate he will assure us that everybody will use them intelligently and everybody will work together in a great, grand partnership. That has been his basic theme throughout our debates but, of course, the Minister has no idea whether that will actually happen. I am sure that it will happen in the vast majority of cases, but it certainly will not happen in every case. The Minister must know that it is almost certain that, before long, the provision for community protection notices will be used in a way that is not being envisaged at the present time and, to that extent, is likely to be abused.
I will speak in particular to Amendments 22NB and 22NG which stand in my name. If a community protection notice is issued to an individual or body, the Bill states that they are required to,
“take reasonable steps to achieve specified results”.
Amendment 22NB deletes this wording because we would like to hear a little more from the Minister as to how this phrase will be interpreted and how it is expected to work. Can the Minister explain what counts as “reasonable” in this context and who will define what would be “reasonable steps”? Is it the intention that the person or body issued with a community protection notice will be told by the person issuing it what will be deemed to constitute,
“reasonable steps to achieve specified results”,
or is that all to be left up in the air?
Clause 40(3)(a) and (3)(b) refer to “specified things” with no requirement to take reasonable steps to do them but Clause 40(3)(c) refers to “specified results” and has a requirement to “take reasonable steps”. Why is there a difference in wording? If the reference to “reasonable steps” is so important, why does it not appear in Clause 40(3)(a) and (3)(b), which refer to “specified things”?
I turn now to Amendment 22NG. Clause 40(8) states:
“A community protection notice may specify periods within which, or times by which, requirements within subsection (3)(b) or (c) are to be complied with”.
Can the Minister explain why the Government have chosen to use the word “may” and not something more specific, such as “must” or “shall”? Why do the
Government feel that there is no need for a specified period within which the requirements will be complied with—that is, requirements that are fair and clear to both the recipient of the community protection notice and the community itself? In what circumstances would a specified period not be helpful or would cause difficulties?