My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Marks, raises the important issue of the protection of complainants of rape and sexual offences from being questioned about their sexual history. As I previously made clear, it is vital that victims have the confidence to report crimes as terrible as rape, and that they have confidence that the criminal justice process will bring offenders to justice. Our message to those who are willing but currently worried about reporting such offences is that they should feel confident about doing so.
When we first debated the issue, I assured noble Lords that we would look at how Section 41 of the Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act 1999 was working in practice. As the noble Lord asked, perhaps I may provide a bit more detail. The Justice Secretary and the Attorney-General have advised me that this will include examining the original policy intent of Section 41, its implementation and how it is operating in practice.
I can confirm that this work will be led by officials in the Ministry of Justice and the Attorney-General’s Office. They will consider carefully the concerns that have been raised and seek views from the judiciary, practitioners and victims groups. This work will be completed in the first half of next year.
We have already made clear our commitment to carry out this work and, in our view, there is no benefit in making it a statutory requirement. In the light of the detail that I have provided, I hope that the noble Lord will feel happy to withdraw his amendment.