Clause 3 - Accreditation and training
Proceeds of Crime Bill
12:15 pm
Mr Nick Hawkins (Surrey Heath, Conservative)
I beg to move amendment No. 3, in page 2, line 23, leave out `must' and insert `may'.
Amendments Nos. 3 and 4 are not being taken together, but they have the same aim, and I wish to explain it. As drafted, the Bill says that the director must establish a system for the accreditation of financial investigators. That is entirely new. As we do not yet know the identity or background of this director, surely the Government should trust him to decide how he carries out his job. We felt that it would be far better if the legislation were permissive rather than compulsory. Once the Government have had their selection procedure and made their appointment, the director, presumably a person with some relevant expertise, might decide that setting up a system for accredited financial investigators was not the way to go.
A recent comparable case, which will be familiar to all members of the Committee, shows how the Government might find that someone whom they had appointed held rather different views from theirs. The Government's much vaunted drugs tsar, Mr. Keith Hellawell, was going to tackle the drugs problem, but now, as the Minister and I were debating only the other evening on the Floor of the House, Mr. Hellawell's policy has been completely torn up by the new Home Secretary. His position has been reduced. His public statements are completely at odds with the new Home Secretary's new policy. If the Government imposed the clause as currently drafted they might find that they had appointed a director who took a different view.