6.8 pm
Police and Justice Bill
12:00 pm
Nick Herbert (Shadow Minister (Police Reform), Home Affairs; Arundel and South Downs, Conservative)
I support the amendments.
Further to my comments about the extension of bail conditions, I add my concerns about where the measure leads us, given that there will be no time limit on or automatic review of the provisions, unless the relevant suspect appeals. I foresee that when dealing with suspects, it might become an option for the police to impose punitive conditions on bail in the hope that that will dismiss the suspect concerned and that the suspect will simply abide by the conditions. That would effectively shut out their need to go to court at all, and might mean that the courts never have an opportunity to consider the matter.
The proposals in the Bill represent a fundamental shift in the balance between the powers that we have traditionally expected the police to deploy and the proper role of the courts. In that context, it is extraordinary that there is no measure to time-limit the provisions and that the Minister would reject one. When my rather too lengthy intervention on the Minister came to an end, I was about to ask whether she was sure that the provision in the Bill was compatible with the Human Rights Act. I suppose that the operation of consent is important, and perhaps that is the answer to my point, but the open-ended imposition of punitive restrictions, with no formal review process, nevertheless seems to contradict the normal processes and principles of natural justice.
I am grateful to the hon. Member for Hornsey and Wood Green for tabling her amendments. Even if she decides not to press them, I hope that she, like my colleagues and I, will be willing to return to the issue at a later stage. Some of the principles that we have discussed will apply to the measures on conditional cautions, under which the same extension of summary justice is proposed. That gives rise to the same profound issue of whether it is proper to allow such an exercise of power without sufficient scrutiny or sufficient checks and balances.