Clause 90 - Civil recovery: freezing orders
Serious Organised Crime and Police Bill
3:45 pm
Ms Caroline Flint (Parliamentary Under-Secretary (reducing organised and international crime, anti drugs co-ordination and international and European issues), Home Office; Don Valley, Labour)
I hope that my contribution will reassure the hon. Gentleman that amendment No. 217 is unnecessary. It would introduce an explicit provision that reasonable legal expenses will be released from the new property freezing order. It is not needed because proposed new section 245C(3) is an illustrative, not an exhaustive, list of the purposes for which exclusions may be made—''may'' being the key term. Accordingly, just because a purpose is not mentioned in the list does not mean that an exclusion cannot be made for that purpose.
One reason for not mentioning legal expenses in the illustrative list in proposed new section 245C(3) is that proposed new section 245C(5) makes it clear that the power to make exclusions includes the power to make them for the purpose of enabling a person to meet legal expenses in respect of proceedings under part 5 of the 2002 Act. Given the general terms of the power to make exclusions—I refer hon. Members to proposed new section 245C(1) and (2)—confirmation that there is power to a make an exclusion in relation to legal expenses in respect of one type of proceedings must be a sure indicator that there is power to make an exclusion in relation to legal expenses in respect of proceedings of any type. Therefore, the matter is covered.
On amendment No. 235, we take on board the points about having access to the assets for legal expenses. As a listening Government, we sometimes learn through the implementation of law what we might not otherwise have understood. So well done to the hon. Gentleman for raising it the first time around. He will note that we are very generous on the Labour Benches.
Amendment No. 235 would remove the prohibition, which applies only in Scotland, on releasing frozen assets to meet a respondent's legal expenses. The amendment that schedule 6 makes to the 2002 Act will allow respondents in England, Wales and Northern Ireland to control access to their frozen assets to meet their legal expenses. Scotland did not want the extension to apply to it, partly because of some of the difficulties encountered in England, Wales and Northern Ireland have not been encountered in Scotland. For that reason, we do not propose any change. That reflects a recognition of operational experience. I am sure that the situation will continue to be monitored in Scotland but, having inquired about it, I do not believe that the measure is detrimental to our proceedings if it does not apply in Scotland.