Schedule 1 — Amendments Related to Part 1
Criminal Justice Bill
2:39 pm
Mr Hilary Benn (Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Home Office; Leeds Central, Labour)
These are technical amendments to correct an oversight in schedule 4 to the Police Reform Act 2002. Schedule 4 allows designated civilian investigating officers to apply for warrants under section 8 or schedule 1 of PACE. In paragraph 16 we built in the usual PACE protections that would apply to a constable obtaining and executing a warrant. Those include, for example, giving full information in the application for the warrant, and those executing the warrant identifying themselves to the occupier of the premises and endorsing the warrant with what was found.
Unfortunately, some of those protections were not replicated in paragraph 17, which deals with warrants issued in relation to confidential material under schedule 1 of PACE. In summary, the amendments deal with that omission. They also make various changes to schedule 4 of the Police Reform Act 2002 to allow for the fact that someone authorised to accompany a designated civilian investigating officer in executing a warrant will, further to clause 2 of the Bill, be able to exercise certain specific powers. Relevant PACE protections must also apply to the actions of such persons. I hope that the House will accept the amendments.