argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2022-01-12
Topic: Government Operations
Robin Granville Hodgson (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I support my noble friend Lord Blencathra. He and I have been chasing down issues with secondary and, tonight, tertiary legislation for some months and have produced reports to that effect that I think have found favour in your Lordships’ House, bearing mind the number of noble Lords who wished to speak in the debate tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Cavendish, last Thursday Government by Diktat, the title of a report by the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee, which I chair, is alive and well and living with the situation that my noble friend wishes to remedy. The issues of regulation and guidance, of who provides the guidance and of how enforceable it is are questions with which the SLSC has been struggling. However, if we have been struggling with that, when it comes to this latest idea the guidance will not even touch the sides of the regulatory process of your Lordships’ House. We as a House will be presented with a series of faits accomplish, and unless somebody is able to persuade the usual channels to find time to debate something, we will just be told, "There it is and off we go" That is not a satisfactory situation. It is part of a much wider issue of how we deal with secondary and, in this case, tertiary legislation, but my noble friend Lord Blencathra has done a valuable service by bringing this case to the surface. We will make progress in this area only if every time we see this sort of thing emerging we raise it, talk about it and try to deal with it. That is why I support the amendment and put my name to it.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2022-01-12
Topic: Law and Crime
David John Maclean (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I think that my noble friend has inadvertently answered the question of when it will be done. It is quite clear, reading between the lines, that the Home Office does not intend to do it ever. So do the Home Office, he and the Home Secretary still stand by the promise of the then Home Secretary in 2012 that this would be put on a statutory footing If I may say so, the Home Office, in drafting my noble friend’s speech, has been a bit disingenuous. It knows fine I am not opposed to the schedule. The schedule was the mechanism by which we could debate the principle of the college not being on a statutory footing. I discussed this with the Public Bill Office. I looked at various ALBs, including the two of which I am a member, and asked the staff whether I could lift 12 clauses from one of them, change the name to the College of Policing and lift the schedule. They said, "That would be 12 clauses to debate. It would be easier, Lord Blencathra, just to find a mechanism to say that the college must be put on a statutory footing before this schedule is approved." I am not opposed to the schedule—no one is. It was a mechanism in order that we could debate the principle. I must say that I am rather concerned by my noble friend’s reply—but also how delighted I am that, on this occasion, the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, and I are on the same side, despite some strenuous disagreements in the past few weeks. I must say to my noble friend that, if I had realised, and had had the nous and wit beforehand to discuss with the Lib Dems and possibly the Labour Party what this amendment was about, we could have had agreement tonight and I could have forced it to the vote and won it. Of course, I am not going to do that tonight, but I can tell the Home Office that this issue will not go away. I detect the mood among other parties here, and I hope among my noble friends as well, that we must honour the Home Secretary’s promise to have this body put on a statutory footing.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2022-01-12
Topic: Law and Crime
David Wolfson (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Beith, for again raising this matter for debate. I am also grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, who is not in her place but who gave up a lot of time last week to discuss this with me and the noble Lord I start by clarifying what we mean by a "position of trust" in this context—there may have been some confusion in Committee. The position of trust offences that we are discussing are set out in Sections 16 to 19 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003. They are necessarily narrow in scope and were never intended to apply in all scenarios in which a person might have contact with, authority over or a supervisory role over another person, even those aged under 18. Rather, these offences were created to tackle potentially abusive relationships between those under 18 and adults who were in specific positions of trust The existing positions of trust, as set out in Section 21 of the 2003 Act, were so drafted in an attempt to capture situations where the young person had a high level of dependency on the adult involved, often combined with some vulnerability. These included those caring for a young person in a residential care home, hospital, school or educational institution. In these contexts, the power dynamic is such that Parliament considered that any sexual activity should be criminalised The law was created, therefore, in recognition of the risk inherent in these types of position and the power the individual could have over the young person, which could impact on and affect the young person’s ability to consent. As such, the offences are committed as soon as the adult in one of these specified positions engages in sexual activity with the young person they are caring for; there is no need to prove any abuse or actual manipulation.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2022-01-12
Topic: Law and Crime
David Wolfson (Conservative, Centre-right): I am struggling with that second point, but let me try to answer the first. On whether I am saying that anybody should be allowed to exploit a young person, the answer is no. Frankly, I do not understand how the noble Lord has reached that conclusion. There is nothing in the provisions about justifying exploitation or abuse up to the point of rape and assault. Maybe this is the confusion that he is under in relation to the second question. At the moment, if someone is caught in a position of trust—let us say, for example, a minister of religion who is 18 and a half—that person is prevented from having any sexual contact with, say, a 17 and a half year-old congregant. Before that person was ordained or appointed to the position as a minister of religion, that person could have had a sexual relationship with a 17 and a half year-old. That is why I am talking about changing the age of consent, because that 17 and a half year-old is able to sleep with an 18 and a half year-old but not if that 18 and a half year-old is, for example, her minister of religion. I hope that answers the noble Lord’s second question, although I confess I did not quite understand it because, if I may say so, it seemed to proceed from a fundamental misapprehension of what we are talking about.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2022-01-12
Topic: Law and Crime
David Wolfson (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, in moving government Amendment 107A, I first thank sincerely all those in both Houses who have campaigned on this important issue, particularly the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, and all those who spoke in the debate in Committee in this House. I know that she wanted to be here this evening, but I am afraid the hour has prevented her doing so. It is right to put on record my thanks for the tireless work she has done in this area, and for the time she gave on a number of occasions to discuss this issue with me. The noble Lord, Lord Pannick, has also been extremely helpful on this point, and I thank them for joining me in putting their names to the amendment I made it clear in Committee that the Government supported the aims of the original amendment put down by the noble Baroness but considered that it was too broadly drawn and would capture conduct that ought not to be criminalised. In particular, I explained in a series of to-and-fro discussions with the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, that the issue of intention needed to be more carefully addressed.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2022-01-12
Topic: Law and Crime
David Wolfson (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I am very grateful for the warm words from across the House and for the support this amendment has received. I will pick up a couple of the points made. First, I respectfully agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Chapman, that we want to normalise and support—to use her verbs—women who are breastfeeding; that is very important. It is a matter for my department in this legislation and for other government departments in other areas. That is certainly our aim I will try to answer the question put by my noble friend Lord Blencathra. This amendment is modelled on the upskirting offence in the Voyeurism (Offences) Act 2019. We want—without getting myself on "Have I Got News for You" for a second time—to avoid capturing people within the offence who ought not to be captured. Let me try to give a different example. The point made by my noble friend was about forgetting intention and purpose. The problem there, for example, could be that if you were running CCTV in a children’s play area and a mother was breastfeeding, you would be taking images of her; you would not have her consent, nor any reasonable basis to think that she was consenting to being filmed. Therefore, you could be committing a criminal offence. That is why here, just like the upskirting offence, there has to be a purpose of sexual gratification or humiliating, alarming or distressing the person photographed The noble Baroness asked me about "humiliating". I again thank her for spotting that word, which comes from the other Act. It is a really important word. I will put it this way: the fact that the person subjectively feels humiliated does not necessarily mean that it is done for the purpose of humiliation. There is not a one-for-one correlation. However, any court will have to ask the question: was this for the purpose of humiliation? That is a question for the court to decide. You look at the circumstances objectively. The fact that the person feels very humiliated is a very important part of answering that question. But I cannot go so far as to say that the subjective feeling of humiliation necessarily answers the legal question. I hope that has answered the noble Baroness’s question. This is an issue that arises in other areas of criminal law as well. Without delaying the House, I hope that that is a sufficient answer for this evening. I am very happy to engage with the noble Baroness further on this.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2022-01-12
Topic: Law and Crime
David Wolfson (Conservative, Centre-right): The question which has to be asked is: was this done for the purpose of humiliating the woman breastfeeding? To answer that you would look at all the relevant circumstances. I would suspect that, rather like the upskirting offence, in the vast majority of cases the question almost answers itself, given our experience from upskirting In this area, as in all areas, if, once the offence has gone into the law, it turns out that there is a problem in prosecuting—for this reason or any other—we will keep it under review, because our intention is to stop the conduct, to make it criminal and thereby punish people who engage in it—but, I hope, to stop it. If there are problems, we will keep it under review, and I am very happy to continue the conversation on that. I will draw my remarks to a close and invite the House to support the amendment.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2022-01-12
Topic: Law and Crime
David Wolfson (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, this government amendment meets a commitment to bring forward proposals on Report to address concerns that the time limit for bringing prosecutions for common assault or battery involving domestic abuse is unfairly short. I am very grateful that, joining my name on this amendment are the names of the noble Lord, Lord Russell of Liverpool, and the noble Baroness, Lady Greengross In response to the amendment tabled by my noble friend Lady Newlove in Committee, we acknowledged that such cases are disproportionately likely to time out. I am pleased now to present our solution to this problem—in the form of government Amendment 107B —to the House.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2022-01-12
Topic: Law and Crime
Andrew Sharpe (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, for raising this important matter. I acknowledge that there is considerable experience of the Food Standards Agency in your Lordships’ House. We support, in principle, the proposal to increase the investigative powers available to the National Food Crime Unit. The fraud cases of which we have been made aware by the chair of the Food Standards Agency, Professor Susan Jebb—as referred to by the noble Lord—are truly shocking Food crime is a very serious issue, with fraud in our food supply chains costing billions of pounds each year. The National Food Crime Unit, which was established to investigate these crimes, should be empowered to tackle them, to improve the response to these cases and to reduce the burden on its colleagues in law enforcement. As such, we are still committed to working with the Food Standards Agency and DHSC, its sponsoring department, on extending certain Police and Criminal Evidence Act powers to the National Food Crime Unit. However, in doing so, we need to work through the implications of this. It may assist the noble Lord if I briefly set out some of the issues we think we would need to explore further First, the exercise of any PACE powers by the National Food Crime Unit must be necessary, proportionate and legitimate. As such, it is important that there are suitable governance, accountability, oversight, investigations and complaints arrangements in place, as there are for the police. The National Food Crime Unit is not a statutory body, nor does it have a separate legal identity. Oversight, governance and the complaints processes sit with the Food Standards Agency board, which commissions independent reviews and facilitates a complaints process which ultimately reports to the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman. There is therefore no formal independent oversight. There is also a lack of clarity on the necessary protocols when PACE powers would be exercised, including in relation to post-incident procedures on seizure, retention and evaluation of evidence, and the treatment of arrested persons without police presence. These are all issues which, I have no doubt, can be resolved but I am sure noble Lords would agree on the necessity of ensuring that the appropriate accountability and governance arrangements are in place, given that we are dealing with intrusive powers of the state. As such, we do not believe that it would be appropriate to extend the search and seizure powers in PACE to the National Food Crime Unit without further consultation on the issues I have described. I do not think the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, misses very much, but that is the answer to his question I reassure the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, that we are committed to taking this work forward with the Food Standards Agency. I do not have a specific answer to the question of the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, on where the dialogue is at the moment. On that basis, I hope that the noble Lord will be content to withdraw his amendment.
Russia: Sanctions — House of Lords, 2022-02-01
Topic: International Affairs
Tariq Ahmad (Conservative, Centre-right): The noble Lord is right on his specific suggestion but, on his broader point about the importance of diplomacy, that is exactly what Her Majesty’s Government are doing, along with our key partners. It is important, though, that Russia also recognises that it is about its actions. Let us not forget that Crimea was annexed—what, eight years ago?—and it has subsequently continued to take aggressive stances on the borders of Ukraine. I said earlier that we have now seen over 100,000 Russian troops amassing across three different fronts. These are not mere exercises; they are attempts to intimidate Ukraine. It is important that we stand with Ukraine and underline the support that we give to it, including what the sanction would be if there was a Russian incursion or invasion into any parts of Ukrainian territory. It is important that Russia understands that message, which is articulated not just by the United Kingdom but by us and our allies. I assure the noble Lord that the door of diplomacy, as I said in my previous answer, is very much open and the UK is at the forefront of that.
Russia: Sanctions — House of Lords, 2022-02-01
Topic: International Affairs
David Trefgarne (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, is it not possible to secure the involvement of the United Nations Security Council more fully in the Ukrainian situation? Is that not the formula we followed back in 1982 when, despite Russian resistance, Resolution 503 was duly passed? It authorised, among other things, the noble Lord, Lord West—Commander West, as he then was—to set sail for the south Atlantic. Sadly, 22 of his brave colleagues did not return.
Russia: Sanctions — House of Lords, 2022-02-01
Topic: International Affairs
Tariq Ahmad (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I am very appreciative, as I often say, for the insights, experience and wisdom within your Lordships’ House. On the specific point that my noble friend raises in relation to the United Nations, as he will note, a meeting on this very issue took place at the Security Council. On initiatives which could be taken, we should never close the route to diplomacy. I believe Russia is now in the chair of the UN Security Council, so surely there is a greater onus on the presidency to demonstrate how it can bring different countries together.
Russia: Sanctions — House of Lords, 2022-02-01
Topic: International Affairs
Tariq Ahmad (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I can certainly provide more details on the noble Lord’s second question. Yes, we are working with key allies, as I indicated, over the course of the last two months and beyond. We have been working with our key European allies and directly with the EU. We have been working with the United States, as well as partners further afield, on how we can act together on the situation in Ukraine. The noble Lord, Lord Collins, mentioned the importance of sanctions and working together in a co-ordinated fashion. I assure the House that we are doing exactly that. On the first question of the noble Lord, Lord Alton, I fear that if I was to say anything further it would run to speculation. But, as my right honourable friend the Foreign Secretary said yesterday in the House of Commons, whether our approach is diplomatic or looking at the issue of economics and the cost of Russia, everything is very much on the table.
Russia: Sanctions — House of Lords, 2022-02-01
Topic: International Affairs
Tariq Ahmad (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, as the noble Lord knows, on the central point of Ukraine joining NATO, it is first and foremost a defensive alliance. A country can make an application and it is considered by all members of NATO. No country should be told specifically that it cannot be a member of a particular alliance; it is very much for Ukraine to request its membership and for members of NATO to decide.
Russia: Sanctions — House of Lords, 2022-02-01
Topic: International Affairs
Tariq Ahmad (Conservative, Centre-right): On the noble Lord’s last point, I suppose I should declare an interest: I am a property owner in London and the south-east. In all seriousness, without going into too much detail, as I said—and I know that the noble Lord, Lord Purvis, had to leave, but I recognise the courtesy extended by his note to me—we are looking at the broader impact, as the noble Lord indicated On the issue of engagement in Washington, I assure the House that we have been engaging on the front foot. Let us not forget that we have been engaging on this issue longer than the current US Administration. We have always made the case as strong partners of Ukraine—one can ask Ministers present and past in the Ukrainian Government. I have sat with a number of them at the United Nations who have indicated their strong support, not through us asking them, but quite genuinely, for the leadership the United Kingdom has showed in solidarity, support and friendship for Ukraine.
Russia: Sanctions — House of Lords, 2022-02-01
Topic: International Affairs
Tariq Ahmad (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I know the noble Lord is probing me for more details, but I shall not say any more. I am fully aware of the sensitivity and impact where such steps are taken. As noble Lords will have followed, and as I sought to inform those on the other three Benches in your Lordships’ House, the broader nature of what we can do once the legislation is effected will allow us to sanction organisations and individuals much more broadly and at direct cost to those entities which are Russian or which are owned by Russian entities and operating within the UK.
Russia: Sanctions — House of Lords, 2022-02-01
Topic: Foreign Trade
Henry Bellingham (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, in the event of general economic sanctions being applied—obviously, let us hope that the diplomatic measures that the Minister outlined will bear fruit—given that Russia and Ukraine between them produce one-third of the world’s wheat supply, we will probably see a massive hike in the price of wheat. What assessment have the Government made of the impact of that on UK food prices, and what contingencies are being put in place to find alternate supplies?
Russia: Sanctions — House of Lords, 2022-02-01
Topic: International Affairs
Tariq Ahmad (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, my noble friend raises a very important point. I think the implications of any sanctions and support are well recognised. I point my noble friend specifically to the steps we have taken just now in support of Ukraine directly, which will be impacted in the first instance, and the new funding I alluded to earlier, looking specifically at the issue of Russian energy supplies. That indicates the seriousness with which the UK recognises the impact of such sanctions However, it is important that Russia understands very clearly and unequivocally that its actions of not just taking but retaining territory, annexing territory, as it is threatening to do now further in Ukraine are firmly unacceptable, not just to us but to our allies and the world community generally. Therefore, it is in Russia’s hand to reflect on what is being said, but this is serious. This is a serious point in the crisis, and it is therefore important that we engage diplomatically and directly. That is why my right honourable friend the Prime Minister and the Foreign Secretary have said directly to their respective counterparts that they wish to meet to discuss with them. One hopes that the diplomatic channel will bear fruit.