- Motion to Agree
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- That the Report from the Select Committee Temporary exclusion; Statements on trade between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom; and Financial Services Regulation Committee (2nd Report, HL Paper 64) be agreed to.
- My Lords, I shall focus on the Procedure and Privileges Committee proposal on the new Standing Order on temporary exclusion, but should there be any questions on the other points covered in the report, I will of course address them in winding up.The proposed new Standing Order on temporary exclusion is the outcome of almost two years’ work, lead in the first instance by the House of Lords Commission as the senior committee with responsibility for safety and security on the Estate. The task of the Procedure and Privileges Committee has been one of implementation, drawing up a Standing Order to give effect to the framework of a temporary exclusion scheme outlined by the commission.The Parliamentary Estate is principally a place of work. It is also an important cultural and educational centre, with many visitors, including a considerable number of school parties. After careful consideration, the commission concluded that a Member charged with serious sexual or violent offences should not have free access to the Estate while awaiting trial. Indeed, if they were staff of the House, they would be suspended pending the outcome of any criminal process.After a consultation to which all noble Lords were invited to contribute, the commission has brought forward proposals for the temporary exclusion of Members charged with specific serious offences. The scheme is designed to be as straightforward and streamlined as possible. It will take effect at the point of charge; it will not be triggered by an unsubstantiated allegation, nor if a Member of the House is investigated or arrested. It will be triggered only when the prosecuting authorities bring charges, having satisfied themselves that there is enough evidence to establish a reasonable prospect of conviction.Exclusion would apply in respect of all serious violent or sexual offences that are liable to a sentence of more than two years’ imprisonment. The process of exclusion would in such circumstances be automatic. Indeed, this is a key feature of the scheme. Once someone has been charged, it is for the courts to determine their innocence or guilt, and no one else. The proposed scheme supports that principle. Exclusion would imply no judgment on the Member concerned; it would be a temporary measure akin to those used in workplaces across the land pending the final decision of the criminal justice system.I turn to the terms of exclusion. The House possesses the power to modify or limit the rights of attendance in specific circumstances. This was reaffirmed by the House in 2009, when it resolved to suspend two Members found to have breached the then Code of Conduct. The power to suspend was subsequently put on a statutory basis, but the House’s inherent power to place conditions or limitations on Members’ exercise of their undoubted rights remains. This is why the proposed Standing Order sets out what excluded Members would not be allowed to do, rather than giving an exhaustive list of what would still be allowed. Excluded Members would not be allowed to participate in proceedings of the House or any of its committees, whether in person or remotely, to enter the Parliamentary Estate, to vote in hereditary Peer by-elections or elections for Lord Speaker, or to undertake parliamentary-funded travel.
- Moved by
- At end insert “, but regrets that the provision on temporary exclusion could enable foreign states to prevent a member from attending the House for up to ten sitting days.”
- My Lords, I am grateful to the Senior Deputy Speaker for the skilful and clear way that he has explained his proposals. I am sure that the whole House is grateful to the House authorities for how they have developed the proposals, which, as the noble Lord explained, work in a slightly different way from those in the Commons but none the less have the same effect of keeping everyone safe on the Parliamentary Estate.Our system will be automatic, avoiding any committee or officer of the House being put in a difficult position. So far as the UK’s criminal justice system is concerned, we can be confident that our independent prosecuting authorities will, in all cases, fairly and competently assess, first, whether the evidence is credible; secondly, whether there is a realistic prospect of conviction, as the noble Lord pointed out; and, thirdly and finally, whether any prosecution is in the public interest. Therefore, in any case of exclusion arising from a charge in the UK, we can be confident that there is a case to answer and that the noble Lord’s proposals are sound.My amendment claims that foreign states will be able to prevent noble Lords attending this House—if only for a short while. This is because with a prosecution in a country with which we might not even be friendly, the Clerk of the Parliaments will have no choice—no discretion—but to exclude a Member who is charged with a relevant offence in that country. There is no sanity test or the need for that country to be a member of, say, the EU or NATO, or even for us to have an extradition treaty with that country. I am sure that the noble Lord will argue that the Clerk of the Parliaments could arrange for the Leave of Absence Sub-Committee of your Lordships’ Procedure and Privileges Committee to consider the matter very urgently, and possibly virtually, which is true. He also told us that the sub-committee is a very small, compact committee.
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- Since 2003, we have set a high and reliable bar for charging decisions in the UK; this might not be the case in other jurisdictions. I am not an expert, but I would not be surprised if, in some jurisdictions, the charging decision is a low-level decision and the main decision is made by some sort of magistrate who decides whether the case should go to a criminal court. Sadly, in many countries, the police are either corrupt, incompetent, underresourced—maybe they are all three—and the same could apply to their court system. It is easy to imagine how a false charge could be laid either accidentally or maliciously with the intent of a foreign Government or even a non-state actor.
- I can assure the House that these proposals are extremely unlikely to apply to me. However, seven of your Lordships exhibit significant physical and moral courage by visiting far-flung parts of the world, often to the irritation of the Governments concerned. The noble Lords do not hesitate to call out serious human rights abuses or corruption, and these proposals would leave them extremely vulnerable to coercion or attack. I propose that the Senior Deputy Speaker puts his Motion to the House in the usual way but undertakes to ask the relevant committees and House authorities, for foreign jurisdictions only, to task the Leave of Absence Sub-Committee with deciding whether a Member should be excluded, rather than have it occur automatically. I beg to move.
- My Lords, I am relieved that the committee did not follow the other place by excluding Members on the basis of allegations alone. That has led to palpable injustices—for example, Andrew Rosindell and his constituents; he was excluded for two years because of malicious allegations that nobody who knew him could possibly have given credence to and which were subsequently rejected.But I am worried that even the proposal the committee does make undermines the sacred principle of innocent unless and until proven guilty, which Parliament ought to uphold more emphatically than everybody else. The report specifically undermines that principle by justifying exclusion on the basis that a charge means that“the prosecuting authorities must be satisfied that there is a realistic prospect of conviction”.In other words, we should assume that anyone charged is probably guilty, not innocent. Secondly, the proposal justifies a precautionary exclusion by invoking that,“the duty of care towards those on the parliamentary estate, including school parties,”—ignoring that they are always accompanied by adults—“should be paramount”.Paramount means it takes precedence over the presumption of innocence or it means nothing.Why should noble Lords, or those who serve us, have more protection than the general public? The courts have the power to hold on remand people charged with serious offences that make them, in the opinion of the court, a potential threat to the public. Why should we second-guess the courts or give ourselves a higher degree of protection than the friends, neighbours and acquaintances of noble Lords elsewhere?Finally, this is a solution looking for a problem. As far as I know, no noble Lord charged with an offence has ever molested anyone on the Parliamentary Estate, least of all the school parties invoked to defend this proposal. I hope the committee will think again and put the presumption of innocence first and foremost.
- My Lords, as a former barrister, may I ask whether it is the committee’s understanding that the presumption of innocence is sacrosanct in our criminal justice proceedings but that in workplaces around the country that face the same issue it is a relevant consideration? There are workplaces up and down the country, such as schools, where you remove somebody from the premises when they are arrested because of the risk they pose.I wonder whether the Senior Deputy Speaker could answer the question of the regret amendment. Is it the same high bar of offence that you would have had to have committed overseas to be temporarily excluded from the premises here?Although the Senior Deputy Speaker outlined the potential risk to children, in the manner of work here, one is often stopped in the corridor, as I have been, by staff asking us to deal with this issue, because they work unorthodox hours in a building that is full of nooks and crannies. As well as their safety, I add that noble Lords need to consider the House’s reputation. We are fortunate to be in a wonderful building that is a UNESCO world heritage site. If anybody were charged with arson and were then able to gain free access to the estate, our reputation would be on the line. Could the Senior Deputy Speaker outline those points?
- My Lords, I thank noble Lords who have participated in this short but important consideration of these proposals, particularly the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, for the amendment. Dealing with that in more detail, the commission considered that the relevant offences set out in the Standing Order would be of significant concern to the Parliamentary Estate regardless of where they were carried out. An automatic temporary exclusion safeguards the parliamentary community—and, indeed, visitors on the Parliamentary Estate—against this risk.I say carefully to the noble Lord, Lord Lilley, that, unfortunately, in the last five years a former Member of the House was charged, convicted and jailed for sexual offences against minors. That would have triggered this Standing Order. It is of concern that the Member attended the House on 10 occasions after charge, including just weeks before his expulsion. Up and down the land, in the judiciary, in the ecclesiastical world and in many companies, this sort of arrangement has developed for important reasons that we should respect. I say particularly to the noble Lord, although I think it is not correct to talk about what the other place may be considering doing, that that is why, following the very long consideration of the commission and the Procedure and Privileges Committee, we thought that the level of charge was the right basis on which we should present this to your Lordships.To answer some of the noble Earl’s questions, we have our own lawyers on hand to advise us, so we would not have to wait for the FCDO, particularly if the House is sitting. There is not a day the House sits when I do not look around at many members of the Leave of Absence Sub-Committee. The fact is that we could meet with nigh on immediate effect.To turn to some of the points on overseas jurisdiction in particular, there is a possibility that Members may be charged overseas when they would not have been liable to such charges domestically. It is for that reason that the exclusion for charges brought outside the UK would lapse after 10 sitting days or two months, whichever is less. It is important that, for the exclusion to be extended, the Leave of Absence Sub-Committee would have to be convinced that the charges brought against a Member met the definition of the serious sexual or violent crime in the UK. This was deemed to be the most effective way of balancing—again, this is about balance—safeguarding and protecting the parliamentary community and visitors while protecting Members from charges that would not trigger the Standing Order if brought by UK authorities.
- My Lords, I am not a lawyer, but I have a couple of questions. I do not quite understand this, and I have read the Standing Orders and looked at the report. Our assumption seems to be that overseas countries have the same independent judiciaries as we have. But nobody has mentioned these countries: Russia and China. Who thinks they have independent judiciaries? All the evidence is that those countries already sanction Members of this House and the other place because of issues that have been raised. As I understand it, the incident—if I can call it that—could be from before someone was a Member of this place, so it could go back. Are we seriously taking countries that we do not believe have an independent judiciary and where, based on cases we read regularly, the Governments are in charge and, frankly, treating them like countries with independent judiciaries and the rule of law? Have I got that right?
- This is precisely why we have made the arrangement in the Standing Order for overseas jurisdictions, particularly because there may well be some countries that deem matters criminal that we do not. It is precisely why, in the statute and in the Code of Conduct, there is this consideration about overseas jurisdictions—and, indeed, why we have factored that into this.
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- Clearly, if a serious violent or sexual offence was committed by a Member anywhere around the world, it would be appropriate for this Standing Order to be in effect. What we, this report and indeed this proposed Standing Order are saying is that there are very strong safety valves, precisely to outline some of the concerns of the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, and the noble Earl. It is precisely to ensure that there is a safeguard with the sort of malicious charge or allegation in a foreign jurisdiction that was bogus or not correct. That is precisely why I spent some time explaining what would happen, in so far as the Leave of Absence Sub-Committee acting extremely quickly. Obviously, if the House was sitting, it could be with immediate effect, on the basis of, in the balance of these things, protecting a Member who was subject to what I think the noble Lord was alluding to. But that is precisely why there is this element we have to factor in about overseas jurisdictions.
- My Lords, I will try to assist the Senior Deputy Speaker and highlight the issue. I certainly understand the problem when you are dealing with a charge in overseas jurisdictions. There are essentially two issues. One is dealt with expressly in the guidance, although in the actual Standing Order the committee is given a broad discretion to take all matters into account. But the sole matter that is looked at in the guidance, and the point the Senior Deputy Speaker has focused on a number of times this afternoon, is whether somebody is charged abroad with an offence that is not an offence in the UK. I am sure we all understand that in those circumstances it would be quite right for the committee to meet quickly and to lift the bar.The concern I have, I think shared by the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, is about the other case: where somebody is charged in an overseas jurisdiction with an offence that is an offence in the UK, but where that jurisdiction is one where the authorities, for one reason or another, are out to get that person, and where a charge in that overseas jurisdiction does not represent the sort of thorough review of the evidence that a charge in this jurisdiction does.I wonder whether the way through might be a clear acknowledgement from the Senior Deputy Speaker that the investigations and assessment by the committee in those circumstances would not be limited to the narrow question of whether the charge in the overseas jurisdiction is also an offence in the UK, but would also include the wider question of whether, in all the circumstances, one can reliably assume that a charge in that jurisdiction carries the same weight as a charge in this jurisdiction would.
- I think that is why we have the ability, within the powers of the sub-committee, to review the point the noble Lord has made. It is within the scope of what is intended, as is the ability for us to act quickly, because of the point I described—if it was not an offence in this jurisdiction—as well as the one the noble Lord spoke of. It is also to assess those circumstances in which the charge may have been made in certain overseas jurisdictions.I hope this does not get activated. But we are charged as a sub-committee with being in a position to keep this under constant review, because we want the right balance of making sure that with overseas jurisdictions we have the ability in this House to act through the sub-committee. If an offence took place in an overseas jurisdiction, rather than in this country, it could well be that we felt that the community here should be protected. The point of trying to get this consistent with the Code of Conduct and previous legislation is to deal with this matter for things happening in overseas jurisdictions.I recommend that we put this scheme forward, with the caveat that we will keep it under review as and if it ever has to be activated.