First, I declare my interest in Suffolk farming, as in the register. I also echo so many others in paying tribute to my noble friend Lord Gardiner of Kimble for the brilliant way in which he has shouldered the very heavy burden of a seven-day Committee stage of this Bill. We owe him a deep debt of gratitude and he is one of the finest Ministers I have known in this House.
I am glad to follow the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford, because I take a rather similar view of Henry VIII clauses, but I recognise that complicated legislation sometimes needs to be reinforced at short notice by statutory instruments. There is one particular point I want briefly to mention at this late hour: the frequent inclusion in statutory instruments of powers of access to premises without a warrant. This has been an abominable abuse of our democracy. The police and the other forces of law and order always require a warrant if they are entering premises, unless they are in hot pursuit, for example. But all too often, particularly in the field of agriculture and food, numerous inspectors, who are not even required to have the courtesy of asking for an appointment to come in, can pounce. I am not saying it is never necessary to pounce, but I am saying that a warrant from a magistrate is absolutely essential before they behave in that manner.
I have been campaigning on this issue for many years, along with my noble friend Lord Selsdon, and we have succeeded in greatly reducing the number of statutory instruments which include powers of entry without a warrant. Indeed, the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments, in the days when it was run by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood, kept a very strict eye on this issue and would challenge when it found statutory instruments slipped in for powers of entry without a warrant. I think that is now less common, but given the taking into the Government’s hands of the whole of agricultural and food policy, previously delegated to Europe, I want to fire a warning shot. I ask the Minister to be quite sure that officials in all these departments are warned that they should not reintroduce the habit of scattering like confetti into statutory instruments unlimited powers of entry with no need for a warrant. It is undemocratic and intolerable, and it must not start again.
9.45 pm