Clause 3
Counter-Terrorism Bill
11:45 am
Dominic Grieve (Shadow Attorney General, Law Officers; Beaconsfield, Conservative)
The Minister raised a point about whether my amendment would confine the revelation of the contents to one person only. That was not the intention and nor do I think that it is what would be achieved—we are in danger of straying into matters of arcane drafting here. The intention—this is what I think would be achieved—was to confine such revelation to anyone involved specifically in the task of separating out the two documents. It would prohibit any contents subject to legal privilege from being revealed to anyone other than those specialists carrying out that work.
If the Minister was a bit bolder, he could accept the amendment, because he could always amend it again on Report if he wanted to. If he could give me a categorical assurance that he will amend the Bill itself, rather than adopting any other approach, I would not press the amendment to a vote. However, I detect—I do not criticise him for this—that he wishes to keep open the option of amending the PACE codes, which I think is insufficient. Without wishing to be confrontational, at this stage the Committee might like sensibly to register its view, which could provide an incentive for the Government to do what we would like.