The three speeches/headings immediately before

1. 1 earlier: Claire Ward

   I am going to make some progress; I will come back to the hon. and learned Gentleman.

   In modernising the law in this matter, we have purposely set a very high threshold for the circumstances in which killing in anger could ever be treated as manslaughter rather than murder. The words and conduct limb of the partial defence is the main plank for achieving this, but we also believe that in relation to sexual infidelity, it is important to set out the position precisely and uncompromisingly—namely that sexual infidelity is not the kind of thing done that is ever sufficient on its own to found a successful plea of loss of control so as to reduce the verdict from murder to manslaughter.

   I want to express one or two concerns about the amendment in lieu proposed by the hon. Member for Cambridge (David Howarth). There may not be sufficient time at the end of the debate—I hope there will be—so I will say a few words about it now. I think I should be grateful to the hon. Gentleman for an amendment in which I believe he is trying to find an alternative form of words to achieve the Government's purposes in clause 45. However, the way in which the amendment is drafted is unacceptable, for two reasons. First, the amendment restricts the possible motives to three: punishment, sexual jealousy, or sexual envy. Therefore, in cases where sexual infidelity is involved, if the defendant argued that the action he or she took was due not to one of those motives, but to betrayal, breach of honour, or outrage to morality or decency, they could rely on the partial defence. Therefore, if the intention behind the hon. Gentleman's amendment is what I would hope it to be, it has a loophole.

   Secondly, the terms of the amendment are drafted too widely: punishing a person for any act perceived as sexual infidelity would not qualify for the partial defence. The Government's amendment would ensure that a partial defence could be used, for example, in the extremely grave circumstances in which a woman killed her husband after she came home and found him raping her child. However, under the hon. Gentleman's amendment, if the act was perceived as sexual infidelity, even though that might not have been the main consideration in the loss of control, its existence would exclude reliance on the partial defence.

2. 2 earlier: Dominic Grieve

   Will the hon. Lady give way?

3. 3 earlier: Claire Ward

   I want to make some progress and deal with a couple of other issues that have been raised in the debate.

   The core argument against this provision, as put forward in the other place, centred on the notion that the Government were not prepared to trust the common sense of the jury. I believe that that is essentially the argument put by the hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield. That argument is simply misplaced. The provision does not reflect a lack of trust in the jury; what it does reflect is the Government's determination to ensure that the law in this matter keeps pace with the times. In this day and age, it should not be possible for any person, regardless of gender or sexuality, to stand up in court and blame their partner—let us not forget that it is the partner that they themselves have killed—for having brought on their own death by having had an affair.