Violent Crime Reduction Bill

My Lords, when I put my name down to speak in the debate I did so in order to speak about a subject that I thought would be brought in under the miscellaneous provisions of the Bill. I was going to speak about legislation that has had unforeseen consequences—the Private Security Industry Act 2001. I now become the third in a hat-trick of Peers to speak on the issue. I do not think that conspiracies are common or efficient. I believe that we are looking at a good old-fashioned cock-up. What has happened is that legislation designed to deal with a real problem has accidentally caught something else. The only part of the sports industry that, because of a history of disturbances, should have had any concern—football—got its act together, and as other legislation already existed, it was not caught by the 2001 Act. The sports that are blessed by not having acquired the idiot-fan/yob element, or have had very few such incidents, now have to fork out a lot of money, either directly or via employees, to make sure that these people are licensed. Yesterday, I had a long conversation—a rather scruffy one over a mobile phone—with the authority. I got a firm, polite response: ““This is the law. It’s our job. We’re going to do it””. To be perfectly honest, I was slightly irritated, but I had to take off my hat to the authority. It was doing its job—enforcing legislation. If we expect it to enforce the law, that is what it will do. We therefore have to change the law. We have to do something here and now and this is a good opportunity to do it. During my discussions on this matter I was informed that talk is going on within Whitehall. People are discussing it. It has been realised that mistakes have been made and there have been unintended consequences. The Government are thinking about how to get round this. If the Minister can give us some guidance about where the talks are going, I will be very glad to hear it. I do not think that anyone should think this is worth going to the stake for. It is simply a mistake. If one looks at the paper trail and at statements, one finds Ministers, sounding slightly embarrassed, saying, ““Oh, it does that?””. That is the interpretation I have got from various meetings. This is something that we should change. We can change it. I do not think anyone will say that if we do it quickly, no one will pay any attention—““We can get it done and the Government needn’t worry about it””. We may try and crow about it, but everyone will say, ““That happened quickly””. The Government can head us off at the pass here. They should take the opportunity. I turn briefly to the rest of the Bill. I was interested in the issue of re-enactment societies that use weapons from after 1870, I think. I have been a Member of this House just long enough to have heard the debate on the original firearms restrictions inspired by the Hungerford massacre. I believe that the date of 1870 was chosen because those designs included a breech that can use a modern cartridge and the technology has not moved on. It will be interesting to see how this works out with groups that do re-enactments. I believe that initially there was panic about it, but I notice that the Minister has sensibly removed groups such as the Sealed Knot. Whatever the statistics on firearms, everybody realises that matchlock muskets are not a favoured weapon for stick-ups. It will be interesting to see how they deal with it. Noble Lords should remember that although jokes can be made about anoraks, these people help in the study of history and to bring history to life for groups. Some form of supportive action would be helpful to these groups. We must ensure that these weapons are made safe, or as safe as possible, while maintaining the authenticity of that historical experience.