My Lords, I am delighted to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, I support a number of the comments she made and I look forward to the answers. I particularly support the
amendments in the group in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Burt, and the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, signed by my noble friend Lord Cormack and others. At another time and in another place, I chaired a Select Committee—on a completely different subject from that before us today—and the annual reports from organisations such as, in this case, the domestic abuse commissioner, are extremely important to Back-Bench Members of Parliament, giving them the opportunity to debate and scrutinise the work undertaken by these bodies.
I believe that these amendments are extremely important. To be honest, I do not know what the situation is if a report is simply made to the Secretary of State, rather than being made more freely available. If a report is made to Parliament, then Parliament and Select Committees have the right to debate it, either in Select Committee or on the Floor of the House, depending on the importance of the contents and of that particular body. I also underline that in other Bills that have come before the House in recent times—looking forward to Committee on the Environment Bill, I am sure this will be commented on again in respect of the Office for Environmental Protection—it is essential that a body such as the domestic abuse commissioner should operate independently of the Secretary of State and the department.
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That became extremely clear in our discussions on the trade and agriculture commission, and I am delighted to say that the Government listened, and we now have a new trade and agriculture commission coming in that will be, in my view, more independent. I add that it is not just independence for the domestic abuse commissioner; she should also have proper resources and staff to ensure that she is able to fulfil her functions without having to go back regularly to request more authorisation from the Secretary of State.
I would be interested to know whether there is any reason why the Bill, as currently drafted, limits the submission of the report to the Secretary of State or whether there was a position of principle taken as to why it would not be made to Parliament alone. However, I am sure that if this debate were to be held, as it will be if an amendment is carried on Report, I am very confident that Back-Bench Members of the other place will be just as keen as we are in your Lordships’ House to ensure that the report is provided to Parliament as the basis for debate and to ensure the commissioner’s independence from the department and operational independence from the Secretary of State. I look forward to hearing my noble friend’s summing up on this small group.