Serious Crime Bill [HL]

I understand the concern raised by the noble Lord, Lord Goodhart; this causes us to look at the matter quite keenly. We think that the way in which we have phrased the provision meets those difficulties. The noble Lord will know that there are situations where the criminal standard, as he rightly says, will have been reached because the individual has been convicted, and we can deal with that. I am grateful to him for accepting the propriety of that position. Anti-social behaviour orders were mentioned by many noble Lords, including the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford; but the way in which the breach of the football banning orders was dealt with is an interesting example of the effectiveness of taking preventative action. We were able to identify those who were likely to be engaged in activity, address the nature of their activity and stop them from carrying it out. There has been a dramatic reduction in offences as a result. Arrests for football-related offences were down by 7 per cent and there was 100 per cent compliance with the conditions of the football banning orders during the recent World Cup. We have all done better for it. These orders will take two forms. Because of the limbs to which I referred, the first being the need to establish whether a serious crime has been committed and the second being on a matter of judgment, the civil standard has to apply. It is a civil preventive order. The civil courts are very used to balancing those two. The Serious Organised Crime Agency has made it absolutely clear that it will want to apply for those orders for those who have been engaged in serious criminal activity. It was suggested that there may have been 25 or 30 such orders. The agency has a spectrum of serious organised crime with which to deal, which means that it has to concentrate its efforts on the most serious criminals to try to disrupt the activity in a way that will reduce crime in our country. It has an enormous job on its hands and it believes that the orders will greatly assist the agency. I hear what the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford, says, that it would be good to get rid of the whole of Part 1. That is not the view of those who are burdened, on our behalf, with trying to interdict the serious criminal activity being carried on in our country.