Racial and Religious Hatred Bill

My Lords, what I said in relation to that was that in a democratic society certain religious beliefs—for example, those involving the abuse of children—would not be given credence because they would not have the dignity that should be given to religious beliefs. I do not think for one moment the fact that Sharia law is something we would not necessarily incorporate into our law means that the Muslim or Islamic faith is not a religion we would express as being acceptable in a democracy. There are two different issues there. As the Joint Committee said, the Human Rights Act is not infringed. It would, in any event, prevent the authorities and the courts from applying the new offence in a way that breached rights under the European convention, such as the right to freedom of thought, conscience and a religion under Article 9, which has been held to include the right to proselytise, and freedom of expression under Article 10. There are two differences in the way in which the Bill comes before the House. As noble Lords will know, the provisions have come before the House on previous occasions. First, I remind your Lordships that there was a specific commitment in my party’s manifesto during the course of the last election to give people of all faiths protection from incitement to hatred on the basis of their religion. The electorate has clearly signalled its support for that manifesto and that is why we have moved quickly to introduce the Bill in this Session. Secondly, the proposed offences are now contained in a single-issue Bill. We have presented the measures in this way because of concerns expressed on the previous two occasions that incitement to religious hatred was somehow being ““hidden”” among other important legislative proposals. I hope that all noble Lords will welcome this change, which will mean that the proposals can achieve the detailed and focused scrutiny they deserve. Indeed, they have already had detailed and focused scrutiny in the other place. The comments made by Dominic Grieve during the Third Reading in the other place are worth noting. He said:"““for the first time in my recollection, we can say that a Bill has had adequate scrutiny in the House””.—[Official Report, Commons, 11/7/05; col. 658.]" Before moving on to consider the provisions of what is a very short Bill, it would be useful to set it within a wider legislative context. This House has a distinguished record in supporting legislation that deals with the harm that hatred can cause to communities. As long ago as 1965, the Race Relations Act outlawed incitement to racial hatred. In 1986, the Public Order Act expanded the offences of incitement to racial hatred. These offences filled an important gap in the law that enabled people to incite hatred against other groups because of their race, colour, nationality or ethnic origin. The offences were needed because the law previously criminalised only incitement to commit actual criminal acts—it did not cover the more insidious behaviour of stirring up hatred against a group of people. Parliament at the time recognised that this was a gap that should be filled and that there was a clear difference between inciting someone to go out and assault a person and a more general incitement to hatred against a group of people. I think we would all agree that the offences have worked well and that they meet an important need, although that was not the universal view when the offences were first proposed. I have not heard anyone suggest that there are difficulties in the way the offences operate or that they have had a negative effect on freedom of speech and debate. Since the introduction of the offences, case law has deemed that Jews and Sikhs are racial groups and are therefore protected by the existing legislation. Again, I have heard no one suggest that Jews and Sikhs should not be protected under the incitement to racial hatred offences. As an illustration, it is perhaps worth reminding the House that the existing offence did not last year inhibit the staging of the play ““Behzti””, which is set in a Sikh gurdwara, and that the play was not prosecuted for inciting hatred against Sikhs, even though it caused intense offence to some Sikhs. I am sure that there are many other examples of works of art and academic and humorous publications and performances which have dealt with matters of race, ethnicity or nationality in ways which some have found offensive but which have not been in the slightest bit inhibited by the existing offence of inciting hatred.