Clause 19 - Power to make emergency regulations
Civil Contingencies Bill
4:15 pm
Ms Fiona Mactaggart (Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Race Equality, Community Policy and Civil Renewal), Home Office; Slough, Labour)
I assure the Committee that we are committed to operating the Bill, and we do not believe that it is possible to do so other than in conformity with the Human Rights Act. For that reason, I recognise the force of amendment No. 97, moved by the hon. Member for Sheffield, Hallam, that a statement of conformity at the point of making regulations could be a useful mechanism to ensure that the intention is fulfilled. In principle, I accept the intention of his amendment, although I would ask him not to press the present formulation. Throughout this process we have made clear our belief that emergency regulations must comply with the Human Rights Act. The Bill already achieves that, but we accept that an explicit statement of this kind will help to make that clearer, and we welcome it.
That brings me on to the reasons for resisting the other amendment. I think these two matters do go together—we are resisting specific statements of this kind. We entirely agree that emergency regulations should not require other people—such as the police or armed forces—to perform acts incompatible with the Human Rights Act. However, the Human Rights Act does not just apply to actions taken by the public authorities themselves, it applies to actions that a public authority requires another person to do. It already prevents regulations being used to require another person to do something which breaches convention rights, and it is unnecessary to restate this on the face of the Bill in the way that this amendment seeks.
The hon. Member for Meirionnydd Nant Conwy raised the question of whether the Bill could be used to amend the Human Rights Act. He will have seen the letter on the Human Rights Act circulated by my hon. Friend the Minister for the Cabinet Office and Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster in the pack that he received earlier today. Our view is that this is not possible, and that the Bill must always be read in the framework of the constitution. Were we to read this Bill in isolation, were there no such thing as the Human Rights Act, it is possible that the provisions cited by the hon. Gentleman could be operated in a way that might breach the Human Rights Act. However, it is not possible to assume that the Human Rights Act does not exist—it does, and it is necessary to read this Bill in conjunction with section 6 of that Act, which provides that it is an unlawful act to do any act which is incompatible with the convention rights. An ''act'', for this purpose, includes the making of secondary legislation. We are resisting amendments that seek to restate something that is inherent in legislation. The suggestion made by the hon. Member for Sheffield, Hallam to make that clearer by requiring a statement of conformity is helpful, and re-emphasises the necessity of conformity. However, the
other amendment is otiose—a word I was challenged to use earlier, and I have succumbed to that challenge—and we shall continue to resist it.