My Lords, of course I am prepared to meet the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, and any other noble Lords on this point to discuss it further. There is certainly a point about the signposting in the code, what the code should say about all this, whether we should give further additional priority to homicides abroad, and exactly what the role of the Homicide Service is and other related resource issues, as well as where the earlier point I raised about priorities comes in: we cannot do everything. This is an important topic for further discussion, and I do not rule out examining further how far we can go in response to the very legitimate concerns raised.
I hope the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, will forgive me for coming to her last, but I think her point was about the definition of a victim where the person is a victim as a result of the criminal conduct of a close family member. The obvious example would be a road incident where somebody who had been driving over the limit or driving dangerously had killed themselves, leaving behind bereaved children. On the wording of the code, those children would be victims. The Government do not think that even in those circumstances should we reduce or limit the concept of a victim. It is conceivable that somebody could be a perpetrator and a victim at the same time, because if you have driven dangerously, had a crash and killed your child, you may both be guilty of criminal conduct and a victim of your own conduct, as it were. That may be a highly theoretical and hypothetical example, but the Government are not proposing any change to Clause 1 in relation to those very tragic kinds of case.
I hope I have dealt with the main amendments proposed in this first group, and I respectfully invite your Lordships not to pursue them at this point.
8.15 pm