I am very grateful to all those who have taken part in the debate. I agree in essence with the point that the noble Lord, Lord Dear, has just made: this is in a sense a re-run of earlier debates. Nevertheless, it is important for me to recite the Government’s position, because some refinements have been made to it and there are important points of distinction.
It might help if I outline some of the general principles behind Clause 5 before moving to the more specific points that have arisen.
There are three important points, and there will probably be a degree of agreement on these in the Committee. First, the police are not and must not be above the law. This is a basic tenet of policing within the democratic framework, and it must be the overriding principle in any debate of this nature. Secondly, and linked to the first point, in limiting the scope of the offence as we have done we have not acted lightly or gone beyond what we feel is absolutely necessary in the circumstances. I fully sympathise with the attempts to widen the scope of the Bill to cover matters more fully, but, for the reasons that I shall enumerate, I cannot agree that it is the right approach.
The third, and perhaps final, general point is that we have to take proper account of the nature of police business. The business of policing, at its most basic, is managing conflicting risks to protect us, the public, from each other. The police are, as the noble Lord, Lord Dear, said, in the front line. We have put them there. They do a job for us. They have no alternatives. There is no one else to whom they can pass the buck, and they are duty-bound to carry out their activities. In contrast to a private organisation, they cannot withdraw their services because of a lack of resources. Instead, they must balance resources in order to meet demand. In doing so they must take into account the public interest on the one hand and the rights of individuals involved on the other.
Where the police function as a normal business in their duties to their employees and as owners of property, we feel that, with some minimal exceptions that I will come to later, the new offence should apply. These are the core health and safety duties that the offence is essentially designed to cover. But, where the police are engaged in their policing activities, our firm view is that it would be wrong to bring in the criminal law, as with military activities. The civil courts have been cautious in judging how far the duty of care should extend. They have not thought it right to try to judge the kind of operational decisions involved in all types of policing activities, and they have been rightly concerned that bringing the courts into this kind of area could make the police risk-averse.
Many noble Lords appear to accept that the police and law enforcers are worthy of special treatment because of their particular position. Drawing a line between the types of activity that the police engage in—which should be in and which should be out—is not easy. I am grateful to noble Lords for their additional contributions in helping us with this consideration. I have to conclude that we are not convinced that they offer enough certainty for the police, or that they are the right way to go. In the light of these arguments and the very persuasive comments during the debate, I hope that I can persuade noble Lords to support the clause as it is and withdraw the amendment.
Before I sit down, I shall try to cover the points usefully made in the discussion. The noble Earl, Lord Mar and Kellie, asked about police being endangered in high-speed chases in pursuit of criminals. The offence does not apply in respect of how police carry out their core functions and how those have an impact on the public. However, the offence applies in these circumstances in respect of the officers themselves. Police forces owe duties to their constables to provide a safe system of work. That makes very few inroads into that.
To answer the point raised by the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, we debated the escort of prisoners by commercial organisations when talking about custody issues. That would be exclusively a public function and therefore excluded.
I am grateful for all noble Lords’ contributions. These are not amendments with which we can agree. We feel that, on exemptions, we have got the balance about right. Having listened to the debate, I believe that, by and large, the Committee agrees with that point. This is a difficult area. It is right that we have this proper debate about where the boundaries should be drawn, but I believe that we have them about right.
Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Bill
Proceeding contribution from
Lord Bassam of Brighton
(Labour)
in the House of Lords on Wednesday, 17 January 2007.
It occurred during Debate on bills
and
Committee proceeding on Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Bill.
About this proceeding contribution
Reference
688 c237-9GC Session
2006-07Chamber / Committee
House of Lords Grand CommitteeSubjects
Librarians' tools
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