Lord Carlile of Berriew: The noble Lord is trespassing on the old Social Democratic Party by using words like disingenuous. I will give him an example: some years ago, I chaired a Joint Select Committee of both Houses of Parliament dealing with the draft Mental Health Bill. That particular Bill was never enacted after our year of meetings and the report that we produced, but there was not a single person or...
Lord Carlile of Berriew: My Lords, notwithstanding the success of S4C, does the Minister agree that BBC Cymru Wales makes an extraordinary, virtuous and unifying contribution to the life of people in Wales? Will he give an undertaking to the House that nothing will occur to undermine the quality of public service broadcasting through the BBC in and for Wales, given the huge contribution that BBC Cymru Wales makes to...
Lord Carlile of Berriew: My Lords, did the Government anticipate the potential use of existing ready-made off-the-shelf companies as instruments of fraud? Is it yes or no?
Lord Carlile of Berriew: My Lords, will the Minister assure the House that, in the Attorney-General’s regular meetings with the Director of Public Prosecutions, she will hold the director to account for the chilling effect of recent changes in CPS charging guidance in relation to rape? Surely it is in the hands of the DPP that the awful statistics can be improved and victims given a proper hearing.
Lord Carlile of Berriew: Given the noble Lord’s criticism of what I said, which he was perfectly entitled to make, does he agree that if the police without suspicion wrongly stop and search people who normally support the police very strongly and obey the law, it will diminish the respect in which they hold the law?
Lord Carlile of Berriew: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, gave an excellent speech in opposition to these government amendments and in support of other amendments tabled, and I have little to add to it. I want to say a word or two about stop and search without suspicion. At one time, every year in London, about 180,000 people were stopped and searched without suspicion under the Terrorism Act. It caused...
Lord Carlile of Berriew: My Lords, I rise to support the original amendment, moved so ably by the noble Baroness, Lady Newlove, and to oppose the amendment to the amendment from the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, which she moved just now. I hope she will forgive me for saying that her introduction of her amendment displayed a great deal of confusion, which is being much magnified in debate, about the differences, in so...
Lord Carlile of Berriew: My Lords, I am pleased to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, in support of her amendments. I want to start by paying tribute to the Minister of State, the noble Baroness, Lady Williams, who has been extremely accessible and helpful. In an attempt to resolve these issues there have been several discussions, some of them initiated by her, and I am sure that those of us involved would...
Lord Carlile of Berriew: My Lords, I strongly support the submissions made by the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, in relation to Amendment 97C. In doing so, perhaps I can give a small insight as someone who has conducted hundreds of jury trials, some of them involving young people—often very naive young people who are in an enormous amount of trouble. I feel it necessary to say something to the House about the...
Lord Carlile of Berriew: My Lords, the aim of this exercise is to ensure that children who enter custody leave it better educated, better able to become part of normal working society and better able to function in a family environment. When Charlie Taylor produced his advice, which has already been mentioned, on the education of children in custody, his aims were exactly those: to ensure that the quality of...
Lord Carlile of Berriew: I apologise for interrupting the noble Baroness, and I am grateful for what she has just said, but I want to go back to a previous point, if I may, because I think we would like an answer to the question I am going to pose at some point in her speech. During the course of her comments earlier, the Minister said—and I think this was a little bit of movement—that the Home Secretary would be...
Lord Carlile of Berriew: I apologise for intervening again. I have got my second wind; it is now tomorrow, which is not commendable. It is a simple question: is it recognised by the Government—and it may be that the Minister would have to take advice on this, which I recognise she might get from the noble Lord sitting next to her—that an unreasonable refusal by the Home Secretary would be, potentially at least,...
Lord Carlile of Berriew: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Beith, with his usual remarkable acuity, has put his finger on a very important point, which is the question of disclosure. It is clear that police forces have tended to use disclosure as the reason for obtaining much of the material that has been unnecessarily obtained, so let us be clear what the duty of disclosure is. There is a duty to disclose to the...
Lord Carlile of Berriew: My Lords, if I may just say a few words in support of this amendment, which was moved with such clarity by the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, two points seem to me to arise. The first is that if the reviews are held in a centralised way, they will be more efficient. There will be less of a postcode lottery when it comes to the review taking place. Secondly, and most importantly, if social...
Lord Carlile of Berriew: Following on from the remarks of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, can the Government agree to the House being adjourned for half an hour or so, so that there can be a discussion between the usual channels and between the groups in the House as to how this should continue? We would be very grateful and it would be seen as a matter of utmost but necessary courtesy.
Lord Carlile of Berriew: I am grateful to the Minister for giving way. One point he has not dealt with, as I understand it, is why the Sentencing Council and sentencing guidelines are not seen as an adequate and flexible mechanism for dealing with cases of this kind. We need a reasoned explanation for the rejection of that proposition.
Lord Carlile of Berriew: The Minister has just given the game away by his slip of the tongue. He said it is a case which should be marked by “a life sentence”, and then he said, “a mandatory life sentence”. He was right before he made the slip of the tongue. That is exactly what judges can do and exactly what the Sentencing Council can deal with. I am afraid that I do not accept that his explanation so far...
Lord Carlile of Berriew: I am sorry to interrupt again, but the Minister has said something completely untenable. He said that under “exceptional circumstances”, the judge has the power to depart from the sentence entirely. That is absolutely not the case. If the sentencing guidelines in front of any judge sitting in a criminal court lead to the conclusion that the starting point for the sentencing process is a...
Lord Carlile of Berriew: My Lords, I am puzzled by the mechanism that the Government are trying to use to increase sentences, which, in some cases, should rightly be higher, in relation to the deaths of emergency workers. After a long period of development, we created a completely new mechanism: the Sentencing Council. Judges must have regard to sentencing guidelines in every case, and those guidelines are complex....
Lord Carlile of Berriew: I did not want to interrupt or contribute to this debate because there have been many eloquent speeches, but I want to ask the Minister a granular question. This is going to turn into a shaggy dog story in which everybody agrees that this 200 year-old legislation is out of date unless somebody sits down and does something serious about it with the intention of bringing the discussion to an...
