My Lords, less than a week ago we debated the Government’s amendments to the Criminal Justice and Courts Bill, and inflicted defeats in relation to proposals affecting young offenders and, even more significantly in terms of their constitutional importance, two changes to the procedures for judicial review.
Today we return to this Bill, a piece of vanity legislation if ever there was one, which, except for Clause 3—as we have heard—adds nothing to the provisions of the Compensation Act 2006, which, by implication, it purports to amend. I concur entirely with the critique of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd, the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, and others of this muddled attempt to deal with a problem for whose very existence there is a complete lack of evidence—a Bill that is very badly drafted, in any case.
At Second Reading, I acknowledged that the House is properly cautious about declining to give a Second Reading to Bills emanating from the Commons, and there is a similar reluctance totally to destroy Bills in the way in which the amendments of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd, would achieve if passed, which would leave the Bill consisting of only its title. However, if we were to go so far on a Bill as feeble as this, it would actually strengthen the hand of the Lord Chancellor in relation to the vastly more important and damaging provisions of the Criminal Justice and Courts Bill, which we have sent back to the Commons with our amendments. I fear that he would not hesitate to cast this House as a recalcitrant and obstructive group, placing us alongside the left-wing pressure groups and campaigners which he conjured up as the phantom proponents of judicial review and opponents of his attempts to undermine it. It would, I suggest, make it more unlikely for the Lord Chancellor to exercise political responsibility in relation to the amendments on secure colleges and JR by accepting them, or, should he fail to do so, for MPs on the Government Benches to demonstrate political heroism in a just cause by voting for them.
For those reasons, I regret that I cannot advise opposition Members to support the noble and learned Lord’s amendment to Clause 2, nor his amendment to Clause 4—in any case, the Government have tabled an amendment to it that reflects one moved by the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, in Committee, to which I added my name. I do that with regret because I share entirely the noble and learned Lord’s criticisms of the vacuous nature of the Bill; but it seems to me, for the reasons that I have given, unwise for the House to join him in the Lobbies. I say that with the more trepidation as I understand that he is the chairman of the East Sussex Rifle Association; I fear that I may end up as a target—if not for the noble and learned Lord, then for some of the members of that association.
There is nevertheless a serious issue as to the role of the House in these strange circumstances. However, in relation to Clause 3, I will be asking the House to agree that it should not stand part of the Bill, essentially because that clause seeks to effect a change in the law that is unacceptable for reasons which I will adduce
when we come to debate that amendment. However, I fear that I shall not be joining the noble and learned Lord in the Lobby—